Minute entry for the meeting of the South Wales & Monmouthshire Zionist Council, dated 30 March 1919. For this entry, the minutes of the last meeting were read out, the L. L. Fine Esq., the Honorary President made “an appeal to all members to assist him in carrying out the work for the coming year”.

The South Wales & Monmouthshire Zionist Council was founded in December 1917. It is said to have existed only for a few years; little is known about the group, and records are sparse.

The term “Zionism” was coined in 1890 by Nathan Birnbaum. It’s general definition means ‘the national movement for the return of the Jewish people to their homeland and the resumption of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel" [source: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/a-definition-of-zionism]. By the spring of 1917, the third year of the First World War, the issue of Jewish statehood loomed large as British and other allied forces were engaging Ottoman Turkish troops in Gaza as part of a Mideast campaign that would soon drive through the Land of Israel. In Great Britain, Zionists were pressing for a statement from the allied forces supporting a post-war Jewish State. Decades of support in Great British for the restoration of the land to the Jews were at a critical juncture [source: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/10211]. This minute book, covering the period from the December 1917 to November 1920, marks that time, and the efforts of the South Wales & Monmouthshire Jewish communities.

Depository: Glamorgan Archives.