Yesterday, after several days of anti-Israel protests at Columbia that included the harassment of students, the obstruction of thoroughfares, and chants of “We are Hamas!,” the school’s Orthodox rabbi informed students that it has become clear “that Columbia University’s Public Safety and the NYPD cannot guarantee Jewish students’ safety in the face of extreme anti-Semitism and anarchy,” and recommending that they leave campus until the situation dies down. Meanwhile, at Yale, a Jewish student was poked in the eye with a Palestinian flag; thereafter protesters tried to prevent her from leaving the scene to seek medical attention.

Seth Mandel comments on the absurdity of calling these demonstrations “anti-war protests.”

I used to shake my head when people would accuse others of being “warmongers,” because the term was so often reserved for people who very obviously did not fit the bill. If you want to know what a warmonger actually is, check out those who have for six months cheered rabidly for the very concept of war itself.

At these Hamas-groupie conventions, you’ll hear and see versions of the slogan “resistance by any means necessary,” which is a call for a war of both conventional and unconventional means.

And of course, how can we forget the Quds Day rally in Dearborn, Michigan? Quds Day, for the uninitiated, was invented by Iran as an excuse to hold anti-Jewish rallies. Muslim leaders in Dearborn led a particularly raucous one this year at which attendees shouted, “Death to America!” Again, not very subtle.

“Never forget the 7th of October,” they shouted at Jews at Columbia last night. “That will happen not one more time, not five more times, not ten more times, not 100 more times, not 1,000 more times, not 10,000. . . . The 7th of October is going to be every day for you.”

If Iran succeeds in obtaining nuclear weapons, the war in Gaza, let alone the protests on college campuses, will seem like a minor complication. Jonathan Schachter fears that this danger could be much more imminent than decisionmakers in Jerusalem and Washington believe. In his view, Israel seems to be repeating the mistake that allowed it to be taken by surprise on Simchat Torah of 2023 and Yom Kippur of 1973: putting too much faith in an intelligence concept that could be wrong.

Israel and the United States apparently believe that despite Iran’s well-documented progress in developing capabilities necessary for producing and delivering nuclear weapons, as well as its extensive and ongoing record of violating its international nuclear obligations, there is no acute crisis because building a bomb would take time, would be observable, and could be stopped by force. Taken together, these assumptions and their moderating impact on Israeli and American policy form a new Iran concept reminiscent of its 1973 namesake and of the systemic failures that preceded the October 7 massacre.

Meanwhile, most of the restrictions put in place by the 2015 nuclear deal will expire by the end of next year, rendering the question of Iran’s adherence moot. And the forces that could be taking action aren’t:

The European Union regularly issues boilerplate press releases asserting its members’ “grave concern.” American decisionmakers and spokespeople have created the unmistakable impression that their reservations about the use of force are stronger than their commitment to use force to prevent an Iranian atomic bomb. At the same time, the U.S. refuses to enforce its own sanctions comprehensively: Iranian oil exports (especially to China) and foreign-currency reserves have ballooned since January 2021, when the Biden administration took office.

Israel’s response has also been sluggish and ambiguous. Despite its oft-stated policy of never allowing a nuclear Iran, Israel’s words and deeds have sent mixed messages to allies and adversaries—perhaps inadvertently reinforcing the prevailing sense in Washington and elsewhere that Iran’s nuclear efforts do not present an exigent crisis.