While most of Tunisia’s Jews left the country during the 1950s and 60s, roughly 1,000 remain on the island of Djerba, which boasts a historic synagogue and a community with its own traditions, living under the protection of the government. The synagogue continues to attract a large wave of pilgrims from abroad on the holiday of Lag ba’Omer, which this year fell last Tuesday. A member of the Tunisian national guard chose the festive occasion to open fire on a crowd outside the synagogue, killing two Jews and three security personnel. Ben Cohen examines how the country’s regime has responded:

A member of the Tunisian Jewish community expressed serious concern regarding the remarks delivered by President Kais Saied to Tunisia’s National Security Council on Wednesday, pointing to the absence of any condemnation of anti-Semitism or condolences specifically directed to the Jewish community. “I heard his entire speech, and I realized that it is probably very difficult for him to mention the word ‘Jews’,” the Jewish community member—who spoke on condition of strict anonymity for fear of reprisals—told the Algemeiner during a telephone interview on Thursday.

“Without a doubt, [Saied] is not only a hater of Israel but also anti-Semitic,” the person added emphatically.

Saied has caused consternation among Tunisian Jews in the recent past, having been taken to task by Jewish organizations in 2021 after he delivered a speech in which he accused Jews of being responsible “for the instability in the country”—an assertion the Tunisian leader later denied making.

Saied’s comments were echoed by other Tunisian political leaders. A statement from the heads of the Tunisian Labor Union (UGGT) condemned the “vile terrorist operation” in Djerba before denouncing “the instrumentalization by the media and foreign circles, by wrongly identifying this heinous terrorist crime with what is called ‘anti-Semitism,’ with a view to smearing Tunisia.”

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.