On Monday, December 12, Joshua Efrem Picard successfully defended his doctoral dissertation, “The Security Pact (ʿAhd al-Amān) and the Bathou Sfez Affair: French Imperialism, Islamic Law, and the Jewish Community of Ottoman Tunisia in 1857,” at his Final Public Oral Examination. The examination committee consisted of his advisor Marina Rustow (NES), Bernard Haykel (NES), and Daniel Schroeter (University of Minnesota).