The past Paschal Re-enactments were held in a school courtyard which became more cramped each year due to the growing popularity of the important event. For this reason the organizers decided to move the event this year to the more spacious location of Mitzpeh Beit Orot, between Mount Scopus and the Mount of Olives, near Emek Tzurim, which faces Judaism's holiest and most relevant site for the occasion, the Temple Mount.

The re-enactment will take place next Monday, just four days before the prescribed time of the Paschal Offering. Event organizers say they want to offer a taste of an exciting, authentic Jewish experience, "with its smells, sounds, and colors that have been lost to us these 2000 years, and to thus arouse a longing to renew this Temple ritual in our day."

Performer Mordechai Yitzhar and his band will be on hand to sing the Hallel accompanied by silver trumpets, just as was the practice in the days of the Temple.

Yesterday tremors were also felt as far as 500 miles away at the national park in India where the Royal couple Kate and William were visiting. Today The Japanese Red Cross Kumamoto Hospital confirmed admitting 45 injured patients, including five with serious problems after a quake of magnitude 6.2 to 6.5 and a series of strong after shocks ripped through Kumamoto city.

Several buildings were damaged or destroyed and at least six people are believed to be trapped under homes in Mashiki and local reports said one woman was rescued in critical condition. Scientists say there has been an above average number of significant earthquakes across south Asia and the Pacific since the start of the year. The increased frequency has sparked fears of a repeat of the Nepal quake of 2015, when 8,000 people died, or even worse.

Christianity's two most important leaders, still officially divided by a thousand-year schism, will be speaking with an increasingly unified voice that has gone beyond the realm of religion to confronting pressing issues such as climate change and humanitarian crises around the globe.

The visit, which comes on the heels of Francis' historic meeting with the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, is evidence of an increasingly important Catholic-Orthodox partnership that has been strengthened by shared concern for Christians being exterminated by Islamic extremists in the lands of Jesus' birth.

Francis has called these indiscriminate attacks on Christians - Catholic, Orthodox and others - an "ecumenism of blood," and it wouldn't be surprising if he uses the term again on Lesbos when he meets with refugees fleeing Syria, Iraq and elsewhere.

"The ecumenical patriarch and popes for the last generation have increasingly begun to speak together on issues of common concern," said George Demacopoulos, chair of Orthodox Christian studies at the Jesuit-run Fordham University in New York. "What you have here is a more specific case: You have the uniqueness of Pope Francis and the ecumenical patriarch at a tipping point in historical and European events."

Yesterday he even took the unprecedented step of revealing the taxes he’d paid over the past six years. Leaders of other parties have responded by summarily publishing their own HMRC returns. In contemporary Britain, where one’s extramarital affairs are more readily discussed in public than one’s tax affairs, this is jaw-dropping stuff.

That will be entertaining for those who like to point fingers, perplexing for those too busy to engage in the detail – and miss the wider truth revealed by the leak which forced all this into public discussion. Because at root, the Panama Papers are not about tax. They’re not even about money. What the Panama Papers really depict is the corruption of our democracy.

Following on from LuxLeaks, the Panama Papers confirm that the super-rich have effectively exited the economic system the rest of us have to live in. Thirty years of runaway incomes for those at the top, and the full armoury of expensive financial sophistication, mean they no longer play by the same rules the rest of us have to follow. Tax havens are simply one reflection of that reality. Discussion of offshore centres can get bogged down in technicalities, but the best definition I’ve found comes from expert Nicholas Shaxson who sums them up as: “You take your money elsewhere, to another country, in order to escape the rules and laws of the society in which you operate.” In so doing, you rob your own society of cash for hospitals, schools, roads…

But those who exited our societies are now also exercising their voice to set the rules by which the rest of us live. The 1% are buying political influence as never before. Think of the billionaire Koch brothers, whose fortunes will shape this year’s US presidential elections. In Britain, remember the hedge fund and private equity barons, who in 2010 contributed half of all the Conservative party’s election funds – and so effectively bought the Tories their first taste of government in 18 years.

What have the super-rich got for their investment in British politics since 2010? Cuts in personal taxes, invitations from George Osborne to advise on overhauling corporation taxes, the security of knowing that their tax havens will be treated with due leniency.

In my politics lessons, we were taught that Britain was a representative democracy. But what 30 years of plutocracy have brought is an era of un-representative democracy. With a few exceptions, our politicians no longer resemble, nor do they work for us. Amid a crisis in the rental market, you have a housing minister, Brandon Lewis, who runs a private rental portfolio. You have a former investment banker, Sajid Javid, now claiming to do his best by the steel industry. And you have a super-rich prime minister who vows he’ll take on tax havens, all the while blocking any serious attempt to do so.

Gavin Bray, a 22-year-old studying international business at Leeds Beckett, barely raised his eyebrows at the news. “As millennials we’re used to [it]” he said. “It started with the tuition fees and now most of us won’t even be able to get a mortgage without the help of our parents. I still love this country, and I am still grateful I was able to grow up here. But this is just one of many reasons I feel I have no future here and will be moving abroad after I graduate.”

His biggest concern is that we have crossed a point of no return. “I fear society won’t have the capability to apply enough pressure into forcing change which may lead to even further secrecy measures and protection. Because it is tax avoidance not evasion it’s not illegal but it is certainly immoral. The beauty of it is the rich still use the society they refuse to contribute fully to. It makes me very happy that these morally inept people have finally been caught out on a grand scale.”

Jose Vinals, the chief of the organization’s financial stability division, said there are several contributing factors, including a huge “loss of market confidence” that would drag down the markets. The IMF report, addressing global financial stability, said “financial and economic stagnation” looms unless governments find a way to avoid the “pernicious feedback loop of fragile confidence, weaker growth, low inflation and rising debt burdens.”

The Telegraph called it the “bluntest warning to date on the costs of policy inaction,” and outlined how investors can “lose faith in policymakers’ ability to revive the global economy.” Vinals predicted the resulting slowdown could knock 4 percent from the world’s output, “relative to current expectations over the next five years,” and he noted a $1.3 trillion corporate debt in China poses “potentially serious challenges to financial stability if defaults pushed banks over the edge.”

Under the scenario he sees possible, Vinals said stocks in the UK, US, Eurozone and China all would lose “a fifth of their value over two years.”

The report by Human Rights Watch and the Harvard Law School International Human Rights Clinic was released as the United Nations kicked off a week-long meeting on such weapons in Geneva. The report calls for humans to remain in control over all weapons systems at a time of rapid technological advances. It says that requiring humans to remain in control of critical functions during combat, including the selection of targets, saves lives and ensures that fighters comply with international law.

"Machines have long served as instruments of war, but historically humans have directed how they are used," said Bonnie Docherty, senior arms division researcher at Human Rights Watch, in a statement. "Now there is a real threat that humans would relinquish their control and delegate life-and-death decisions to machines." Some have argued in favor of robots on the battlefield, saying their use could save lives.

But last year, more than 1,000 technology and robotics experts — including scientist Stephen Hawking, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak — warned that such weapons could be developed within years, not decades. The UN meeting of experts on the issue, chaired by Germany, continues talks that took place in April 2015 and May 2014.

The Daily Mail has the story (3/29/16): “Former [British] science chief: ‘MMR fears coming true’”. “A former Government medical officer responsible for deciding whether medicines are safe has accused the Government of ‘utterly inexplicable complacency’ over the MMR triple vaccine for children.” “Dr Peter Fletcher, who was Chief Scientific Officer at the Department of Health, said if it is proven that the jab causes autism, ‘the refusal by governments to evaluate the risks properly will make this one of the greatest scandals in medical history’.”

“He added that after agreeing to be an expert witness on drug-safety trials for parents’ lawyers, he had received and studied thousands of documents relating to the case which he believed the public had a right to see.”

“He said he has seen a ‘steady accumulation of evidence’ from scientists worldwide that the [MMR] measles, mumps and rubella jab is causing brain damage in certain children.” “But he added: ‘There are very powerful people in positions of great authority in Britain and elsewhere who have staked their reputations and careers on the safety of MMR and they are willing to do almost anything to protect themselves’.”

The new device is being built by Cellebrite, the Israeli company that is thought to have helped the FBI crack the iPhone 5c belonging to San Bernadino terrorist Syed Farook. Mobile telephones and other personal electronic devices have drastically increased the instances of distracted driving, leading to accidents and deaths.

In fact, according to German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung, the dispatcher involved in the Bad Aibling rail accident which killed 11 people in Germany was apparently distracted by a game on a smartphone. The idea was proposed by a draft legislation in New York, which would require drivers to submit their phones for testing, if pulled up by authorities.

"Reports indicate that 67 per cent of drivers admit to continued use of their cell phones while driving despite knowledge of the inherent danger to themselves and others on the road," the draft law said.

The study is the first broad look at how fast food may expose the public to certain chemicals, called phthalates, that are used to make plastics more flexible and durable. The chemicals, which don’t occur in nature, are common in cosmetics, soap, food packaging, flooring, window blinds, and other consumer products. The Centers for Disease Control says "phthalate exposure is widespread in the US population."

Though the health consequences of encountering these substances aren’t fully known, scientists have increasingly focused on their effects on health and development, particularly for pregnant women and children. Research in rats has shown that they can disrupt the male reproductive system, and there’s evidence for similar effects in humans. The latest research suggests that fast food is a significant source of the chemicals, which may leach into food from machinery used in processing or packaging, or from gloves worn by workers.

Ami Zota, assistant professor of environmental and occupational health at the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health said that for people interested in reducing their exposure, “common-sense approaches will take you a long way. Eat organic when you can. If you can’t, still try to eat fresh vegetables,” she said. "Try to eat low on the food chain."

In the study carried out by Australia's Queensland University (QUT), it compared the effects of sugar to those of cocaine and likened the symptoms of coming off it to going 'cold turkey'. Neuroscientist Professor Selena Bartlett from QUT's Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation said the study, which has just been published by international research journal PLOS ONE, shows drugs used to treat nicotine addiction could be used to treat sugar addiction in animals.

“The latest World Health Organisation figures tell us 1.9 billion people worldwide are overweight, with 600 million considered obese,” she said. “Excess sugar consumption has been proven to contribute directly to weight gain. It has also been shown to repeatedly elevate dopamine levels which control the brain's reward and pleasure centres in a way that is similar to many drugs of abuse including tobacco, cocaine and morphine.”

“I never thought that I would be accepted into a human school,” the robot said upon hearing of his successful enrollment at Hisashi High School in Waseda, Fukushima Prefecture. He also promised to “try my best,” TASS reported.

Pepper comes to the school with an impressive array of language skills, speaking both Japanese and English. He will mostly take part in English classes, though the school has told Pepper than he can also visit other classes and activities. Teachers believe learning alongside Pepper will be a positive experience for students, encouraging their desire to learn new information.

"You have people who feel that if a school library buys a copy of the Bible, it's a violation of church and state," says James LaRue, who directs the Office for Intellectual Freedom for the American Library Association, which released its annual 10 top snapshot of "challenged" books on Monday, part of the association's "State of Libraries Report" for 2016.

"And sometimes there's a retaliatory action, where a religious group has objected to a book and a parent might respond by objecting to the Bible." LaRue emphasized that the library association does not oppose having Bibles in public schools. Guidelines for the Office for Intellectual Freedom note that the Bible "does not violate the separation of church and state as long as the library does not endorse or promote the views included in the Bible."

The ALA also favors including a wide range of religious materials, from the Quran to the Bhagavad Gita to the Book of Mormon. LaRue added that the association does hear of complaints about the Quran, but fewer than for the Bible.

Taking a page straight out of the 1980’s Afghanistan playbook, these strategic weapons were provided to extremist groups in an effort to assist in toppling the Assad government. The truth was laid bare by Saudi Foreign Minister Abdel al-Jubeir, in an interview with German publication Der Speigel, when he said, “We believe that introducing surface-to-air missiles in Syria is going to change the balance of power on the ground … just like surface-to-air missiles in Afghanistan were able to change the balance of power there.”

In 2005, RAND Corp commissioned a study which concluded that an attack on a civilian airliner would cause a global freeze on air travel that would amount to over $15 billion in losses. Now, over a decade later the numbers would be substantially higher. With al-Qaeda’s affiliates in Syria now having advanced US surface-to-air missiles, it presents a strategic threat that former CIA director David Petraeus labeled, “our worst nightmare.”