This week in power: Obama plans, Egypt movie ban, Brooks column, SXSW

A roundup of the most talked about political and global stories in the Jewish world this week:

Obama's coming
“What should Barack Obama, who is to visit Israel next Wednesday for the first time in his presidency, do about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?” ” target=”_blank”>wrote Herb Keinon in The Jerusalem Post. Stay tuned next week.

Movie delayed
A documentary about Egypt’s Jews that was scheduled to screen this week in the country was suspended after security officials “delayed the renewal of its authorization,” ” target=”_blank”>said the film's producer in a post on the film's Facebook page. “I announce the delay of the screening of Jews of Egypt until a solution is found for this inexplicable problem, inherited from long years in the parlours of the Egyptian state securities and which aim to terrorise thought and repress creativity.” He is also threatening to take legal action for financial losses incurred due to the delay.

Brooks column
New York Times' columnist David Brooks took a trek to an Orthodox neighborhood in Brooklyn and lived to tell the tale in ” target=”_blank”>said Jane Eisner in The Jewish Daily Forward, but it's only half the story. Other bloggers were even more aghast over the overlooking of key facts. “The people who shop at Pomegranate voted with their tuition dollars and sent their daughters to Brooklyn schools that emphatically and purposely do NOT prepare their students for careers as US attorneys. If Brooks was attempting to be a journalist rather than a publicist he might have discovered this,” ” target=”_blank”> looking for a religious experience while staying there. Chabad couldn't really sit out such a festivity, could it? “#openShabbat is like any of the umpteen other events put on throughout the week, except for one rule: no technology,” ” target=”_blank”>joked Tablet's Adam Chandler about the event. Some savvy Jewish entrepreneurs ” target=”_blank”>wrote Steve Lipman in The Jewish Week. “Their Haggadah, they say, is meant for people like them: committed to Jewish life but not committed to strict Jewish observance. Based on several years of research, it evolved from notes Bronfman used at the seders he led for friends and family.” For the more historically-minded, this Haggadah could be just the right fit.