In the latest massive attack by Russia on Ukraine, 20 people were killed, as 130 drones, 48 cruise missiles, and some ballistic missiles were launched at Ukraine, according to Ukraine’s Air Force, as reported by Al Jazeera.
Ukraine claimed that 161 targets were downed overnight.
Putin March 2023 Image Credit Creative Commons
Putin Back in July of 2020 Creative Commons Image
Children were among those killed, Ukraine said.
The attack struck multiple areas within Ukraine, including Kyiv, Poltava, Dnipropetrovsk, and Kharkiv. A missile strike on a residential building in Pryluky, in the northern Chernihiv region, killed at least 14 people, four of them children, Al Jazeera said, while 50 more people were injured.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said on social media, after that attack, that the focus was on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, and that “Russians wanted to strike painfully and demonstratively.”
However, the attacks also hit both industrial facilities and residential buildings.
“Another sleepless night, another act of terror, after which people still have to plan their working day despite everything,” Dmytro Lubinets, Ukraine’s parliamentary commissioner for human rights, said in a Telegram post after the attacks.
Zelensky also posted a video of rubble being cleared from the attack on the residential building in Pryluky, and of ongoing rescue efforts.
Russia’s View
According to Al Jazeera, Russia’s Ministry of Defense claimed that it had carried out a “massive strike” on what it called military-industrial facilities in Ukraine.
One major target was Fire Point, the world-renowned Ukrainian defense company that makes drones and other weapons.
Russia, Al Jazeera reported, attacked sites where the company makes and scores Flamingo cruise missiles.
The report also said the Russian attack hit “port and ship-repair infrastructure,” as well as vessels themselves.
Zelensky noted that Wednesday is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s birthday, and called the residential building a “birthday gift to Putin.”
Striking Back
Zelensky added, per Al Jazeera, that Ukraine had succeeded in hitting four Russian targets in the last 24 hours, including a pair of oil facilities, while responding in the Black Sea.
He called it “Ukraine’s just response to all Russian strikes against our people,” over multiple videos of targets on fire.
Ukraine has had some good battlefield news in recent days: Per the New York Times, Ukraine has successfully clawed back some land in the Donbas region in Eastern Ukraine, an area that Putin has claimed throughout the war that it was “inevitable” that Russia would capture in total.
The Russian president has also called Russian control of that region a nonnegotiable aim of the war.
An offensive by Ukraine in recent months, the report said, has “thwarted Russian efforts to encircle the remaining Ukrainian-controlled cities in the region.”
The offensive is called “Operation Vivaldi,” named for the Italian composer’s “The Four Seasons.” As a result, Russia has lost “dozens of square miles of territory” since launching the offensive.
It’s part of a pattern, the Times said, in which Russia’s gains of territory have slowed considerably, with September considered Russia’s worst month for territorial gains inside Ukraine since June of 2023.
Russia, per the newspaper, claimed last month that it had gained 2,000 square miles this year, but noted that even “ultranationalist Russian military bloggers” have pushed back on that figure, expressing worry that the Donbas initiative has been failing.
Still, the Times reported that the battle lines can be complicated.
Nowhere on the Donbas map, Col. Oleksandr Rashevsky, commander of the “Liut” Joint Assault Brigade, told the Times, is it simple to say, “Up to this point, one side controls the territory, and beyond it, the other.”
Trouble in the Black Sea
The BBC reported this week that a merchant ship has sunk after a drone attack in the Black Sea, and its crew is missing; a second ship has also been hit within Bulgaria’s exclusive economic zone, although its crew was rescued by Bulgarian soldiers.
The report said the sunken ship was flying the flag of Togo.
Prime Minister Rumen Radev condemned the strike but did not specifically name Russia.
“Such an attack within the Bulgarian exclusive economic zone is absolutely unacceptable,” the prime minister said, according to the BBC.
The Al Jazeera report also said that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had pressed Putin this week to “ensure safe navigation in the Black Sea.” Erdogan also offered to help to facilitate talks between Russia and Ukraine.
About the Author: Stephen Silver
Stephen Silver is an award-winning journalist, essayist, and film critic, and contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review, and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. For over a decade, Stephen has authored thousands of articles that focus on politics, national security, technology, and the economy. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) at @StephenSilver, and subscribe to his Substack newsletter.
