As Jerusalem lurches toward what some are already calling a third intifada, terrorist attacks have spread throughout the country. In the Galilee town of Kafr Kanna, an Arab Israeli named Kheir Hamdan attacked a group of police officers with a knife and was then shot while trying to flee the scene. The incident and its aftermath, writes Ruthie Blum, highlight the volatility of the social climate:

In spite of the fact that the focal point of the current Arab uprising is Jerusalem, police in other Arab-populated areas have been trying to prevent an already volatile atmosphere from escalating. In such a climate of rock-throwing, fire-crackers, Molotov cocktails, and hit-and-run terrorist attacks, law-enforcement agents are in a state of constant jitters. . . .
Following [the] revelation [of the details of the attack], a storm ensued, as did calls for investigations into the “unnecessary killing” of Hamdan. Even many mainstream Israelis have been saying that the police “could have shot him in the leg.” Arab Knesset member Ahmad Tibi called the incident a “cold-blooded execution,” and demanded that the officer who shot Hamdan be immediately arrested and put on trial.

MK Mohammad Barakeh, Kafr Kanna Mayor Majhad Awadeh, and other Arab dignitaries joined thousands of Israeli Arab demonstrators on Saturday as they chanted, “Zionists, get out of our lives,” while waving posters of Hamdan saying, “His only crime was being an Arab.” In fact, his “crime” . . . was terrorism. And while he is hailed as a martyr, the policeman who shot him will be dishonored and possibly imprisoned. It is this societal situation, more than any weapons deemed fit in the PA for an intifada, that ought to spring Israel into high alert.

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.