1,200-Year-Old Soap Factory Unearthed in Negev Desert
RAHAT, ISRAEL—The Times of Israel reports that a 1,200-year-old soap factory has been unearthed in the Negev Desert by a team of Israel Antiquities Authority researchers, with the assistance of local high school students. Archaeologist Elena Kogen-Zehavi said the large, pillared structure where the olive oil–based soap was made dates to the Islamic Abbasid period, after the Arab conquest of the region.