In a recent speech on behalf of Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign, the anti-Semitic activist Linda Sarsour declared that “at a time of startling rise in white nationalism and anti-Semitism, I would be so proud to win [the election], but also to make history and elect the first Jewish American president.” Jonathan Tobin comments on the Sanders’ decision to make Sarsour one of his official surrogates:

Sanders . . . is in a fierce competition with Elizabeth Warren and a number of other Democratic contenders for the votes of the party’s left-wing base, which united behind him in opposition to Hillary Clinton four years ago. So it says something important about the tone of the nomination battle that Sanders and his team think that Sarsour will help him more than her baggage will hurt him.

Sarsour and her apologists on the Jewish left claim that she is misunderstood, pointing to gestures like her fundraising to help vandalized Jewish cemeteries even if it is unclear how much, if any, help she has actually given to such causes. They will repeat this line by citing her statement supporting Sanders, in which she spoke of her pride in helping elect a Jew and opposition to anti-Semitism. But Sarsour’s ideas about what constitutes anti-Semitism have nothing to do with the reality of left-wing hatred of Jews and everything to do with the attempt by some to [use concerns over anti-Semitism] against President Trump.

Does Sanders think his Jewish origins give him a pass for employing someone who not only works for Israel’s destruction but has also done much to promote anti-Semitic invective? Jewish or not, he and his trumpeting of Sarsour as a key member of his campaign—who would likely think herself entitled to a significant administration job if he won—makes history in a way that ought to make Jews shudder.

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.