In a report in its latest edition, the weekly publication said that Merkel’s camp was “furious” at a leak of confidential consultations between Jerusalem and Berlin in the German capital in February, which subsequently appeared in the free Israel Hayom daily, owned by staunch Netanyahu supporter Sheldon Adelson.

Furthermore, the magazine said, the leaked details of Merkel’s remarks were “twisted” to give the impression that she supported Netanyahu’s position that a two-state solution with the Palestinians was currently unfeasible, whereas the chancellor had actually said that Israeli settlement construction “makes it unlikely that a viable Palestinian state can be established in accordance with plans aimed at a two-state solution.”

The Süddeutsche Zeitung reported Thursday on German government plans to deploy troops to Lithuania. An entire NATO battalion could be stationed in the country under German command, according to the report. Similar initiatives by the NATO military alliance are planned in other Eastern European NATO member-states.

A government spokesman told the newspaper that several allies were currently considering “stronger engagement as part of the reassurance of Eastern alliance partners and collective defence.” This review was taking account of “the relevant changes in the European security situation, particularly the security needs of Poland and the Baltic states.”

Demonstrators burned tires on a motorway and threw fireworks and flares at officers, according to a police spokesman. A police helicopter was sent to the scene, while water cannon and pepper spray were used on the crowds. The conference at the Stuttgart Exhibition Centre, which was attended by nearly 2,000 AfD members, was delayed by an hour.

Footage on social media showed the protesters shouting slogans such as: "Keep refugees, drive Nazis away!" and "We'll get you all." AfD, which wants to ban the burqa and outlaw minarets in Germany, is expected to announce that it is explicitly anti-Islamic during the meeting. The party was due to set out its manifesto ahead of country's general election next year. Proposals under consideration include withdrawing from the euro and the reintroduction of army conscription.

The anti-immigrant party won three key states in regional elections last month, claiming almost a quarter of the vote in the relatively poor eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. AfD is now represented in eight state legislatures.

In early January, North Korea successfully carried out a hydrogen bomb test, putting a satellite into orbit a month later, in violation UN Security Council resolutions. In March, the UN Security Council adopted a resolution that imposes additional sanctions on North Korea, aiming to affect multiple sectors of the country’s economy.

That same month North Korea conducted multiple short and medium-range rocket launches. "We will not allow for war and chaos to break out on the Korean Peninsula. This situation is not in the interests of any country," Xi Jinping stressed on Thursday.

The test of the developmental DF-ZF hypersonic glide vehicle was monitored after launch Friday atop a ballistic missile fired from the Wuzhai missile launch center in central China, said officials familiar with reports of the test. US intelligence officials have assessed that China plans to use the glider to deliver nuclear weapons through increasingly sophisticated missile defenses.

The DF-ZF also could be used as part of a conventional strategic strike weapon capable of hitting targets around the world within an hour. Mark Schneider, a former Pentagon strategic forces specialist, said the new Chinese hypersonic glider is a serious threat. “The Chinese probably see this as one of their ‘assassin’s mace’ weapons which are designed to defeat the US.”

Now it seems like our media companies have, as they say, kicked it up a notch. The emergence of virtual-reality devices may seem like a really neat way to give kids a more immersive experience. Indeed, earlier this year McDonald’s launched a promotion in Sweden of Happy Meal boxes that could be turned into virtual-reality viewers.

Unfortunately, we have no idea what the effect of putting these headsets on kids will be. And the manufacturers seem to acknowledge that. Samsung’s manual for its Gear VR reads: “Not for use by children under 13. Watching videos or playing games with the Gear VR may affect the visual development of children. When children, age 13 or older, use the Gear VR, adults should limit their usage time and ensure they take frequent breaks. Adults should monitor children closely after using the Gear VR if children feel discomfort.” Ha!

What are the chances such a device would be in the home of any kid and they wouldn’t actually get the chance to use it? Pretty slim. But parents should beware. Kids who are still getting used to what is a part of the real world may not be ready for a virtual one yet.

There followed a predictable flurry of condemnation, including chastisement from the president of Germany’s own Bundesbank, Jens Weidmann, who saw it as a challenge to the independence of the European Central Bank. Thereby reprimanded, Mr Schäuble has since rowed back somewhat on his remarks.

He didn't need to. The German finance minister was, as ever, bang on the money; negative interest rates are indeed part of an increasingly potent cocktail of complaint against Europe which is fueling support for the anti-immigrant, anti-euro Alternative für Deutschland (AfD). Mr Schäuble should not be pilloried for saying so.

Other German politicians have gone further still. Hans-Peter Friedrich, a former interior minister, said that the ECB’s easy-money policies had led to “a massive loss” of the central bank’s credibility, and he called for the installation of a German president to restore monetary discipline to the central bank’s ever more unconventional ways.

Germans look at the ECB’s ever more desperate attempts to generate growth, and all they see is a massive transfer of wealth from creditor to debtor nations. Such transfers may be just about tolerable within nations, where shared interest in adversity is more readily accepted, but when it happens between nations, it is certain to cause a backlash. To Germans, it looks as if they are being made to pay through the burden sharing actions of the ECB for the past profligacies of the Club Med nations.

The further integrated union would not only take a central hold over economic and fiscal matters, as well as internal markets, but would also include social and cultural affairs and foreign, security and defence policy of member states. The paper says “concrete” proposals” to enhance European Union (EU) integration will be drawn up at a meeting in Luxembourg in May, just a month before the UK holds its In/Out referendum on June 23.

The news will come as a blow to pro-EU Prime Minister David Cameron who has sought to reassure voters Britain will not be part of a European superstate. The joint declaration says: “We are convinced that new impetus must be given to European integration. We believe that more, not less, Europe is needed to respond to the challenges we face.”

It says deeper integration “should not be limited to the field of economic and fiscal matters, or to the internal market and to agricultural policy”. It adds: “It should include all matters pertaining to the European ideal - social and cultural affairs as well as foreign, security and defence policy. The current moment offers an opportunity to move forward with European political integration, which could lead to a federal union of States.”

The Gundremmingen plant, located about 120 km (75 miles) northwest of Munich, is run by the German utility RWE. The viruses, which include "W32.Ramnit" and "Conficker", were discovered at Gundremmingen's B unit in a computer system retrofitted in 2008 with data visualisation software associated with equipment for moving nuclear fuel rods, RWE said.

Malware was also found on 18 removable data drives, mainly USB sticks, in office computers maintained separately from the plant's operating systems. RWE said it had increased cyber-security measures as a result. W32.Ramnit is designed to steal files from infected computers and targets Microsoft Windows software, according to the security firm Symantec.

Conficker has infected millions of Windows computers worldwide since it first came to light in 2008. It is able to spread through networks and by copying itself onto removable data drives, Symantec said.

Breitbart London reported that the exercise was attended by 600 members of various European police and military forces, in a bid to prepare the united troops of the European Gendarmerie Force. The military police group is made up of seven European nations, including Spain, Romania, Poland and Germany, and aims to quell post conflict scenarios within EU member states.

The group’s website reported that: “The aim of the [2016, April 15th] Comprehensive Live Exercise will be capacity building of police and gendarmes who will participate in international stabilisation missions and projects with a police component.” It went on to describe the exercises carried out, including “carousel training, with attention being given to all policing skills, including community policing and social patrols, crowd and riot control, SWAT teams and forensic investigation”.

European affairs spokesman for the German Government Andrej Huko asked to attend, but was blocked from coming close to the site. He claimed that the military force was preparing to shut down “political meetings” and “protests”. He went on to argue that the “militarisation of the police” is “extremely worrying and contrary in Germany to the principle of separation of police and military”.

It comes as fears rise that the European Union could form its own army, with one ex-commander of British troops in Afghanistan claiming it could undermine NATO and UK defences.

Italian PM Matteo Renzi said it would be a "flagrant breach of European rule" and the policy is "utterly removed from reality." Tensions in Europe are at boiling point after Austria outlined plans earlier this week to install a 370 metre-long fence at the Brenner Pass, which is the busiest route through the Alps for heavy goods vehicles.

It comes just weeks after the country announced large fences are also to be built at the Moschendorf, Heiligenbrunn, Heiligenkreuz and Nickelsdorf border crossing points throughout the Burgenland region, before migrants travelling by foot arrive.

The move has incensed Italian politicians. Italian interior minister Angelino Alfano criticised the plans as the numbers of migrants passing from Italy to Austria were at their lowest levels for years. Mr Alfano said: “The logic of raising barriers is unacceptable. I will tell him very clearly that unilateral decisions go against European rules.” There are also concerns any toughening of border controls at the Brenner Pass would slow traffic on an important route from Italy to Germany, Italy's top trading partner.

After close to 50 years of control over the Golan Heights, this should not have been much of a shock. But the Arab world immediately went into an uproar, and the UN Security Council has taken action. In a unanimous decision, the UN Security Council has announced that Israel’s claims to the Golan Heights are “null and void and without international legal effect.”

Asking Israel to give the Golan Heights back to Syria is kind of like asking the United States to give Texas back to Mexico. It just isn’t going to happen. But thanks in large part to pressure from the Islamic world, the UN Security Council remains bound and determined to take that strategically important sliver of land away from Israel.

Meanwhile, top rabbis over in Israel are convinced that the arrival of the Messiah is imminent. Two extremely prominent figures in the Jewish faith recently got together for a very important conversation, and this made headlines all over the world… Much of their conversation centered on expectations regarding the coming of the Messiah.

Rabbi Kanievsky said that troubles were to be expected. “It is the days before Messiah,” he explained. Rabbi Kanievsky answered that the Messiah should be arriving in the very near future. He quoted the Talmud (Megillah 17b) again, saying, “In the year after shmittah the Son of David will come.” The year after the Shemitah on the Jewish calendar ends this October, so until then messianic expectations will be running high in Israel.

But at the same time, a geopolitical drama is playing out on the world stage which may eventually result in a great war coming to the land. If the UN Security Council does decide to pass a resolution permanently dividing the land, that is going to cause tensions in the region to go through the roof.

As a reminder, the reason for the electrical rationing was the water content of Venezuela's Guri Dam, which supplies more than two-thirds of the country’s electricity. As The Latin American Herald Tribune wrote a month ago, the dam “is less than four meters from reaching the level where power generation will be impossible. Water levels at the hydroelectric dam are 3.56 meters from the start of a ‘collapse’ of the national electric system. Guri water levels are at their lowest levels since 2003.

Alas, since this plan was doomed to fail as the Venezuela economy would produce even less output as a result of the extended weekend, things went from comical to farcical overnight when the Venezuelan gift kept on giving, and the nation expanded the three-day weekend to five days, declaring a two-day work week for government workers, adding it was seeking international help to save its power grid amid a drought that threatens the capital’s main source of electricity.

Marcus Pretzell is waiting. He's a member of the European Parliament with the right-wing populist party Alternative for Germany (AfD) and he's sitting on the podium at the Yalta International Economic Forum, an event hosted by the Russian government at a resort on the occupied Crimean Peninsula. Pretzell has been seated directly next to the moderator.

The panel host then finally asks Pretzell to speak. "We at Alternative for Germany represent not only a threat to the Ukrainian government, but also to the German government," he proudly announces. The audience applauds. He then goes on to say that good economic relations with Russia "are in the interest of the German people" and that sanctions should be lifted immediately. The applause grows. In Russia, the moderator adds, people have the impression that the German people are of the same opinion as Pretzell. "Marcus, you have made 140 million new friends today."

Russia also has many friends in the AfD. Leading party officials are pursuing a clearly pro-Russian path and are trying to establish tight relations with people in President Vladimir Putin's circle. The right-wing populists are undeterred by the Kremlin's anti-liberal, anti-American and homophobic ideology. On the contrary: For large parts of the AfD party base, those factors appear to make Russia an attractive partner. At the same time, the AfD, with its critical stance toward the EU and NATO, also appears to be a natural partner for Putin.

Now, though, the relationship is advancing past the stage of discussions and conferences: The youth wing of the AfD is forming more formal ties with the youth organization of Putin's United Russia party.