Born in Germany in 1891, Abraham Fraenkel embarked on a highly successful career as a mathematician. In the 1960s, while living in Israel, he wrote a memoir about his life up until the early years of the Third Reich. At one point he reminisces about some of the outstanding mathematicians he knew in pre-World War II Germany and their reactions to the changing climate there, including one of the rare Gentile professors who stood up for Jewish colleagues:

In his time, David Hilbert (1862–1943) was the most significant mathematician in the world. . . . Students flocked to him from all over Europe and the United States. . . . Hilbert always remained free of all national and racist prejudices. After the turn of the 20th century, he had a large number of Jewish students, both in absolute and relative terms. In his own working life, he was greatly influenced by two Jews, Adolf Hurwitz and Hermann Minkowski. His authority and tenacity managed twice to break through the [pre-World War I] prejudice in the Prussian Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs against appointing Jews to full professorships: Minkowski in 1902 and Edmund “Yechezkel” Landau in 1909. . . .

Hilbert’ s response to a question [posed to him by] Bernhard Rust, the Nazi minister for science, education, and popular culture, was typical. At a banquet in 1934 in Göttingen, Rust asked: “Is it really true, Herr Professor, that [the mathematical institute you direct] suffered so much from the departure of the Jews and their friends?” to which Hilbert replied, in his characteristic East Prussian dialect: “Suffered? No, it hasn’t suffered, Herr Minister. It simply doesn’t exist anymore!”

Analyzing the recent direct Iranian attack on Israel, and Israel’s security situation more generally, Michael Oren looks to the 2015 agreement to restrain Iran’s nuclear program. That, and President Biden’s efforts to resurrect the deal after Donald Trump left it, are in his view the source of the current crisis:

Of the original motivations for the deal—blocking Iran’s path to the bomb and transforming Iran into a peaceful nation—neither remained. All Biden was left with was the ability to kick the can down the road and to uphold Barack Obama’s singular foreign-policy achievement.

In order to achieve that result, the administration has repeatedly refused to punish Iran for its malign actions:

Historians will survey this inexplicable record and wonder how the United States not only allowed Iran repeatedly to assault its citizens, soldiers, and allies but consistently rewarded it for doing so. They may well conclude that in a desperate effort to avoid getting dragged into a regional Middle Eastern war, the U.S. might well have precipitated one.

While America’s friends in the Middle East, especially Israel, have every reason to feel grateful for the vital assistance they received in intercepting Iran’s missile and drone onslaught, they might also ask what the U.S. can now do differently to deter Iran from further aggression. . . . Tehran will see this weekend’s direct attack on Israel as a victory—their own—for their ability to continue threatening Israel and destabilizing the Middle East with impunity.

Israel, of course, must respond differently. Our target cannot simply be the Iranian proxies that surround our country and that have waged war on us since October 7, but, as the Saudis call it, “the head of the snake.”