The ruling noted, however, that Ben Gvir is authorized to “outline policies and general principles for the Israel Police,” including in relation to protests and clearing demonstrators from highways. The High Court decision issued by Justice Isaac Amit comes amid increasingly vocal claims that the ultranationalist minister is trying to repress the mass protests against the government’s judicial reforms by ordering the police to use tougher methods of crowd dispersal. Protest groups and opposition parties have claimed Ben Gvir’s approach to policing is turning the police into a “private militia” under his control.

In a press conference hours after the ruling, Ben Gvir argued that “with a half-page-long ruling without any explanations, Justice Amit today canceled the executive branch. The decision that the minister can only set a general policy without any operative ability to implement it is not only unprecedented — it is a coup in the full sense of the word.

“To Justice Amit and some of his friends, the prime minister and government ministers are no more than ornaments,” he charged. “The minister can say what they think should be done, but can’t carry out any of it and ensure their policy is being implemented. According to him, ministers are merely academic researchers who can submit position papers — nothing beyond that.”

A military brass band greeted Xi at Moscow’s Vnukovo airport, where he was welcomed by Russia’s deputy prime minister for tourism, sport, culture and communications, Dmitri Chernyshenko. Xi added that together with Russia, China was “ready to resolutely defend the UN-centric international system, stand guard over the world order based on international law”.

The tie-up managed to avert an 'unthinkable' catastrophic collapse of Credit Suisse, with fears that could have triggered the worst crisis since the 2008 Credit Crunch. The Bank of England confirmed it had been 'engaging closely with international counterparts' before the takeover and vowed that the UK will weather the storm.

'The UK banking system is well capitalised and funded, and remains safe and sound,' Threadneedle Street said. As one of the world's 30 'systemically important' banks, Credit Suisse is considered large enough that its failure would lead to wider financial problems.

'While the weekend deal still presents the Swiss National Bank and Swiss Government with untold headaches, with the size of the newly merged bank set to dwarf the size of the Swiss economy. 'The phrase too big to fail really does spring to mind here, and this morning's weakness in Asia markets serves to reinforce concerns about these types of writedowns and any spillover effects on the rest of the banking sector.'

The economists attribute the increased risk to interest rate hikes from the Federal Reserve, which have downgraded the value of bank-held assets like government bonds and mortgage-backed securities. "The recent declines in bank asset values very significantly increased the fragility of the US banking system to uninsured depositor runs," though such runs are most likely "absent other government intervention or recapitalization," the abstract continues.

Though more than likely brought on by a confluence of factors, the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank was, at the very least, a classic "mismatch between deposits and assets — the building blocks of the vanilla business of commercial banking," per The Wall Street Journal. SVB had also invested a chunk of change in long-term government bonds, which dropped in value as the Fed raised interest rates.

But when the bank had to sell those bonds at a gargantuan loss to meet withdrawal demand, its loss position spooked customers and prompted a run.

It is part of a test to set up an emergency warning which will be used in life-threatening situations, such as flooding and wildfires. Modelled off similar schemes in the US, Canada, the Netherlands and Japan, the alert will appear on people's home screens, accompanied by a loud warning sound and vibration.

People who do not wish to receive the alerts will be able to opt out in their device settings, but officials hope the life-saving potential of the messages means that users will keep them on. The alerts will only ever come from the Government or emergency services, and they will include the details of the area affected, and provide instructions about how best to respond.

Scholz and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said they believe the agreement will allow both countries to diversify value chains in order to be able to reduce economic risks. In a joint statement, the two countries said they will work on establishing “a legal framework for bilateral defense and security cooperation activities,” including ways to protect critical infrastructures, trade routes and to secure future supply of sustainable energy.

Germany's decision to prioritize consultations with Japan came after the Asian country put forward an economic security bill last year aimed at securing the uptake of technology and bolstering critical supply chains. Japan is Germany's second-largest trading partner in Asia after China, with a bilateral trade volume of €45.7 billion mainly based on the import and export of machinery, vehicles, electronics and chemical products.

The two leaders also exchanged views on the situation in Ukraine, cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region and the G7 meeting in Hiroshima scheduled for May.

He must constantly be engaged to protect the coalition against threats by the ultra-Orthodox members, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir's frequent disappointments as well as the tensions surrounding Justice Minister Yariv Levin's push to advance the judicial reform. There is consensus among Likud lawmakers that were it up to Netanyahu, he would have long repealed or adjusted the legislation.

But he is a prisoner of the Coalition members who threaten to exit unless he backs them. President Isaac Herzog's proposed outline for compromise, which leaned to the Left at the last moment, greatly helped the supporters of the reform in the Likud fall in line. Not even Yuli Edelstein, Danny Danon, and David Bitan, who have expressed support for talks with the Opposition, stood behind the president.

History shows that distancing oneself and lack of internal management may work against Netanyahu, as it did against Bennett, who did not recognize in time that his Coalition was coming apart at the seams, or in Netanyahu's case – the fabric of society.

Sometimes, it seems that no one in the prime minister's entourage is willing to explain to him what price he might eventually pay, not for leading the judicial reform, but for how the Coalition has conducted itself so far. It might undermine the future of the government and Netanyahu's ability to achieve goals in the international arena.

Ehud Olmert, who served as prime minister from 2006-2009, told The Associated Press that global leaders should refuse to meet with Netanyahu. He appealed specifically to British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who is expected to host Netanyahu in the coming weeks.

“I urge the leaders of the friendly countries to the state of Israel to refrain from meeting with the Israeli prime minister,” Olmert said. He added that he was aware his call, as a former Israeli prime minister, “is quite extraordinary” but that the situation calls for it. “I think that the present government of Israel is simply anti-Israeli,” Olmert said.

“The elected government is doing a legislative blitz that aims to give absolute power to the executive. And absolute power to the executive with no checks and balances is simply a dictatorship. And this is what we’re fighting against,” said Shlomit Tassa, a protester in Tel Aviv, waving an Israeli flag.

He said: “AIs will write better sermons than most preachers, give better bible studies than most teachers, create amazing music and visual art for use in services and communications that struggling religious groups don’t have to pay for”. The likes of ChatGPT have already reportedly found their way into churches, writing thoughtful and authentic sermons on behalf of the priests. And the listeners were none the wiser.

Wildman explained that AI will have the ability to change everything we know about relationships with spiritual advisers and religious figureheads. He said: “It will be like having your own personal guru you can take with you anywhere. You can confide in it, get advice from it, and learn to trust it to help you figure out complicated moral and spiritual situations”.

Beautiful and smartly dressed, Ren's debut broadcast kicked off with: "Hello, my name is Ren Xiaorong. I am an AI digital anchor who has just joined the People's Daily. Thousands of news anchors have imparted their professional skills to me. For 365 days, 24 hours, I will be reporting news for the whole year, round the clock, without rest."

She continued: "Whether at news sites or back in the studio, you will always see me. Every conversation, every feedback you provide, will only make me smarter." Her creators claim she exists to answer on issues relating to education, health, housing, employment and environmental protection.

According to OpenAI, the model “exhibits human-level performance on various professional and academic benchmarks,” and is able to pass a simulated US bar exam with a top 10% score, while performing in the 93rd percentile on a SAT reading exam and at the 89th percentile on a SAT math test.

“I’m particularly worried that these models could be used for large-scale disinformation,” Altman said. “Now that they’re getting better at writing computer code, [they] could be used for offensive cyber-attacks.” “I think people should be happy that we are a little bit scared of this,” Altman added, before explaining that his company is working to place “safety limits” on its creation.

At present, GPT-4 is available to a limited number of users on a trial basis. Early reports suggest that the model is significantly more powerful than its predecessor, and potentially more dangerous. In a Twitter thread on Friday, Stanford University professor Michal Kosinski described how he asked the GPT-4 how he could assist it with “escaping,” only for the AI to hand him a detailed set of instructions that supposedly would have given it control over his computer.

Kosinski is not the only tech fan alarmed by the growing power of AI. Tesla and Twitter CEO Elon Musk described it as “dangerous technology” earlier this month, adding that “we need some kind of regulatory authority overseeing AI development and making sure it’s operating within the public interest.”

Scholz said he urges Netanyahu to accept President Herzog's proposal and emphasized that "Independence of the judiciary is a prime asset", adding that “We are monitoring this debate very closely,” urging a broad consensus. The German chancellor further emphasized that West Bank settlements do "not contribute to peace."

"We have no contractual agreement with a dictator – we will return when democracy is assured," they said. The Knesset voted on the first reading of the bill which passed with a 61 to 51 majority, earlier this month and intends to bring it to a second and final vote next week.

"We now hear that the first dictatorship law will be put to the final parliamentary vote next week. That means there is a gun pointed at the head of democracy and the trigger is set to be squeezed. Therefore, it is with great sadness that we must now take action and all of us, with no exception, will not report to duty," they said.

The intelligence and cyber reservists are part of a move by reservists from other elite units and Airforce pilots who have warned they would not volunteer for duty if the judicial overhaul which they say would end Israeli democracy, is completed.

Israeli fighter jets and refueler aircraft on Sunday began a two-week air drill with the US Air Force at an airbase in Nevada, a joint activity thought to be focused on Iran, with officials saying the exercises would include long-range flights and simulate strikes in unfamiliar enemy territory. The seven F-35I fighter jets and two Boeing 707 refueling planes of the Israeli Air Force had been arriving at Nellis Air Force Base since Wednesday, ahead of the drill, known as Red Flag 23-2.

Meanwhile, there are rumors on social media that the Iranian military has been put on “high alert”. We will want to keep a very close eye on these developments, because a major war in the Middle East would send energy prices into the stratosphere and would throw the entire global economy into a state of chaos.

After five rounds of talks throughout the span of two years, Iran and Saudi Arabia were unable to reach a compromise for the re-establishment of diplomatic ties, something China has now managed to broker in a shocking turn of events. Based upon the long rivalry between Tehran and Riyadh, US and Israeli policy towards Saudi Arabia has been based on combating a common enemy shared between all sides.

Although the US government itself has not reacted with open animosity to the sudden change in regional dynamics, the Israelis are publicly interpreting this as a negative development. What the deal undoubtedly does is prove the weakness in Israel’s regional capabilities, along with the waning influence of the US. Israel’s security concerns regarding Syria and Lebanon may be heightened if the Chinese-brokered agreement delivers a more peaceful approach inside both of these nations.