This week in power: Peace progress and ScarJo ad fallout

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

Is peace possible?
Things got testy again after ” target=”_blank”>asked Juan Cole on his site.

“This is not rocket science. The core elements of any two-state deal are well known. But neither side has been ready to embrace the suboptimal middle ground where peace is made. What is needed now are 'pull factors' that begin to allay the core fears of both sides,” ” target=”_blank”>sink early this week amid criticism over Scarlett Johansson's appearance in their Super Bowl ad. What sounded like a good idea, faced with a week of chatter over the controversy, wound up being anything but for them. It wasn't just that, ” target=”_blank”>backfire. But how do you actually measure successor failure? “YouTube versions of Johansson’s Super Sunday commercial had millions of hits by midday last Friday, and the number was growing by the hour,”