Born in or near Vilnius, Shabbetai ha-Kohen (1621-1662) spent his final years as the rabbi of the Moravian city of Holesov, now in the Czech Republic. Shabbetai, known to posterity by the acronym Shakh, was one of the foremost talmudists of his day, his most important work being a commentary on part of the Shulḥan Arukh—by his day the standard code of Jewish law. Local archivists in Holesov are now trying to assemble a library of historic copies of his works:

The Holesov synagogue bought at a New York auction a copy of Shakh’s commentary on Shulḥan Arukh, printed in 1677, which makes it the oldest of Shakh’s books in its collection. . . . [Acquiring the work] “is an extraordinary success because such copies are almost unavailable on the market and one can only very seldom find them,” the Holesov synagogue administrator Vratislav Brazdil said. . . . The Holesov synagogue also bought a copy of a newer edition of the commentary issued in 1711.

Brazdil began to create the rabbi’s library several years ago. He has been buying the books in online auctions organized abroad. At present, the library has 25 volumes that are displayed in what was once Shakh’s study, which was opened in the upper floor of the synagogue two years ago. . . .

A Jewish community appeared in Holesov as early as the 15th century. About 1,700 Jews still lived there in the 19th century. However, the Nazis destroyed the community during World War II. The local cemetery, with 1,500 gravestones, and the synagogue are among the . . . oldest Jewish [historic sites] in the Czech Republic.

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.