Archaeologists have discovered a Roman-era oil-lamp workshop in the village of Shikhin in northern Israel. Robin Ngo writes:

The lamps from Shikhin are estimated to have been made between 70 and 135 CE—between the end of the first Jewish revolt against Rome and the end of the Bar Kokhba revolt. “One type of lamp [found at the site] is a relatively plain lamp that resembles the well-known Herodian lamp with a ‘spatulated’ or ‘knife-pared’ nozzle,” explained [the excavation’s director, James Riley] Strange. “It was made in two molds, one for the bottom half of the lamp and another for the top half—both halves also molding the nozzle, which was pared after the two halves were joined.”

“The [other] kind of lamp is called a ‘Darom’ or ‘southern’ lamp,” Strange continued. “It was originally made in the Daroma region of Israel, south and west of Jerusalem. Most famously, lamps of this type were found in hideaway caves near the Dead Sea.”

The lamp workshop may also provide insights into the lamp makers themselves. “It may tell us something about the migration of Jewish lamp makers north into the Galilee from Jerusalem and Judea after 70, and perhaps again after 135, bringing their artisanal traditions with them and distributing their wares in the Galilee.” said Strange.

While it is commendable that administrators of several universities finally called upon police to crack down on violent and disruptive anti-Israel protests, the actions they have taken may be insufficient. At Columbia, demonstrators reestablished their encampment on the main quad after it had been cleared by the police, and the university seems reluctant to use force again. The school also decided to hold classes remotely until the end of the semester. Such moves, whatever their merits, do nothing to fix the factors that allowed campuses to become hotbeds of pro-Hamas activism in the first place. The editors of National Review examine how things go to this point:

Since the 10/7 massacre, Columbia’s Jewish students have been forced to endure routine calls for their execution. It shouldn’t have taken the slaughter, rape, and brutalization of Israeli Jews to expose chants like “Globalize the intifada” and “Death to the Zionist state” as calls for violence, but the university refused to intervene on behalf of its besieged students. When an Israeli student was beaten with a stick outside Columbia’s library, it occasioned little soul-searching from faculty. Indeed, it served only as the impetus to establish an “Anti-Semitism Task Force,” which subsequently expressed “serious concerns” about the university’s commitment to enforcing its codes of conduct against anti-Semitic violators.

But little was done. Indeed, as late as last month the school served as host to speakers who praised the 10/7 attacks and even “hijacking airplanes” as “important tactics that the Palestinian resistance have engaged in.”

The school’s lackadaisical approach created a permission structure to menace and harass Jewish students, and that’s what happened. . . . Now is the time finally to do something about this kind of harassment and associated acts of trespass and disorder. Yale did the right thing when police cleared out an encampment [on Monday]. But Columbia remains a daily reminder of what happens when freaks and haters are allowed to impose their will on campus.