Israel kills Hezbollah commander in Beirut strike, Netanyahu vows to continue ‘with full force’

(NEW YORK) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is accusing Russia of using Chinese satellites to photograph nuclear power stations in Ukraine as part of preparations to potentially strike them.

Zelenskyy made the accusation in an interview with ABC News’ Good Morning America co-anchor Robin Roberts on Monday during a visit for the United Nations General Assembly this week in New York.

“The recent information is that, Russia has been using Chinese satellites and taking photos of the details of the objects on nuclear facilities,” Zelenskyy told Roberts. “And in our experience, if Russia takes photos of certain objects, then there is a threat of strikes against the nuclear objects.”

See more of Robin Roberts’ exclusive interview with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and first lady Olena Zelenska at 8:30 p.m. ET Wednesday on ABC News Live and streaming on Hulu on Thursday.

Zelesnkyy did not say whether the Chinese satellites that Russia has used were commercial satellites or controlled by the Chinese government.

He said he would share the information Ukraine has with leaders who can influence Russia, calling it “nuclear terror.”

Asked to comment on Monday, China’s embassy in Washington did not immediately respond.

If confirmed, the use of Chinese satellites to photograph Ukrainian nuclear plants would be another example of Russia turning to China for assistance in the war. It would also raise questions about the strength of Russia’s own satellite capabilities.

Since its invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia has turned heavily to China for assistance in supporting its economy, as well as keeping its military running. Although China has so far stopped short of directly providing weapons to Russia, Western countries and Ukraine have become increasingly concerned about the growing scale of China’s support for Moscow despite U.S. and allied sanctions.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell last week warned the U.S. believes China is now providing direct assistance to Russia, supplying military components.

“These are not dual-use capabilities,” Campbell told reporters in Brussels, according to Politico. 

“These are component pieces of a very substantial effort on the part of China to help sustain, build and diversify various elements of the Russian war machine,” he added. “We’re seeing efforts at the highest levels of both governments to try to both hide and protect certain elements of this worrisome collaboration.”

Zelensky’s allegation that the satellite imagery indicates Russia may be preparing to hit the nuclear plants follows similar warnings from his foreign minister last week.

“According to Ukrainian intelligence, [the] Kremlin is preparing strikes on Ukrainian nuclear energy critical objects ahead of winter,” foreign minister Andrii Sybiha wrote on X on Saturday. 

The attacks would focus on the transmission substations and other “open distribution devices” at the nuclear stations, he wrote.

“Damage to those facilities creates a high risk of a nuclear incident with global consequences,” he wrote, adding Ukraine’s security services had shared the intelligence with its partners and that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had been informed.

Before Russia’s invasion in 2022, Ukraine was operating four nuclear power stations. The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant has been under Russian occupation since the first months of the invasion, but the other three remaining plants continue to supply Ukraine with power.

Some experts believe that while Russia is unlikely to directly target the reactors of nuclear plants, its frequent attacks on transformer substations linked to the plants pose a serious and worsening threat.

Russia “can and has extensively struck the transformer substations that deliver energy to the nuclear power plants and distribute power from the reactors to the rest of the country,” Dr. Jack Watling and Darya Dolzikova wrote in a report from the British defense think tank the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), this month. “Not only do such attacks prevent the distribution of energy from the remaining unoccupied reactors to the rest of the grid, but they also pose a serious nuclear safety risk.”

Damage to the transformers can disconnect the plants from off-site power supplies, disrupting the functioning of key reactor systems, but also preventing them from offloading energy to the grid, sometimes prompting emergency shutdowns of reactors, they wrote.

Russia’s campaign to destroy Ukraine’s energy infrastructure has inflicted heavy damage, with Ukrainian and Western officials warning the country faces an extremely difficult winter. Russian strikes have cut Ukraine’s capacity to generate energy by more than half, according to Ukrainian officials and independent experts.

Ukraine’s pre-war generation was between 32 to 25 gigawatts (GW) of power. But now the country struggles to produce just 9 GW, according to the RUSI report. Authorities this summer have imposed rolling blackouts to preserve the grid, with most Ukrainians already living without power for many hours a day.

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(LONDON) — The Israeli military expanded its Lebanon campaign with hundreds of airstrikes on Monday, as the long-simmering border conflict with Hezbollah threatened to explode into a larger war.

Dozens of Israeli warplanes struck more than 1,300 targets in southern Lebanon on Monday morning, according to the Israel Defense Forces.

At least 492 people were killed and more than 1,600 wounded in the ongoing strikes, among them women, children and medical personnel, the Lebanon Ministry of Public Health said. Of those killed, 35 were children and 58 were women, the ministry said.

Israel also said it launched a targeted strike in Beirut. At least six people were injured in that airstrike on a residential building in Bir al-Abd, a southern suburb of Beirut, according to Lebanese state media.

Hezbollah officials said senior commander Ali Karaki — who Israeli sources confirmed was the target of the Beirut strike — survived the attack.

In a statement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed Israel was changing “the security balance, the balance of power in the North.”

“For those who have not yet understood, I want to clarify Israel’s policy — we do not wait for a threat, we anticipate it,” Netanyahu said. “Everywhere, in every arena, at any time. We eliminate senior officials, eliminate terrorists, eliminate missiles — and our hands are bent.”

“Whoever tries to hurt us, we hurt him even more,” he added.

The attacks coincided with a warning by from IDF spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari of more planned Israeli strikes against Hezbollah “terrorist infrastructure” in the border region and elsewhere.

Hagari said civilians in Lebanese villages used by Hezbollah for military purposes should “immediately move out of harm’s way for their own safety.”

Video and photos showed bumper-to-bumper traffic as people tried to flee southern cities.

Following the intense strikes in the south of the country on Monday morning, Hagari said the IDF would soon start hitting targets in the eastern Bekaa Valley — another Hezbollah stronghold. Hagari claimed that every house by Israeli munitions contained “rockets, missiles, UAVs that are intended to kill Israeli civilians.”

Hezbollah returned fire across the border with dozens of projectiles, the IDF said, with alarms sounding across the region. Some munitions were intercepted and some fell in open areas, the force wrote on social media.

There were about 250 launches from Lebanon into Israel on Monday, according to Israeli Emergency Officials. Hagari said there had been about 700 launches in the last week.

Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency service reported at least one man injured by shrapnel in the Lower Galilee area and another lightly hurt while making his way to a shelter.

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said in a social media post that Israel “will act with full force” to change the current situation in southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, Katz said, “has taken the people of Lebanon hostage, placing missiles and weapons in their homes and villages to threaten Israel’s civilians.”

“This is a clear war crime,” Katz said. “We will not accept this reality.”

“The people of Lebanon must evacuate any home turned into a Hezbollah outpost to avoid harm,” Katz continued. “We will not stop until the threat is removed from Israel’s citizens and the residents of the north return safely to their homes.”

Thousands of Lebanese cell phone users received a text message from the IDF on Monday, warning: “If you are in a building where Hezbollah weapons are located, stay away from the village until further notice.” Similar messages were issued over Lebanese radio.

The fresh Israeli warnings come after a weekend of intense cross-border fire, with rockets, missiles and drones launched into Israel by Hezbollah met by Israeli airstrikes across southern Lebanon.

Fighting between the IDF and Hezbollah has been constant since Oct. 8, when the Iranian-backed militant group began attacks into Israel in protest of the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip targeting Hamas. Hezbollah has said it will continue its attacks until Israeli forces withdraw from the Palestinian territory.

Tens of thousands of Israelis fled border regions under Hezbollah fire since the fighting began. Their return is a priority for Netanyahu and his government.

“We will take whatever action is necessary to restore security and to bring our people safe back to their homes,” Netanyahu said on Sunday.

Israeli leaders are also demanding that Hezbollah withdraw beyond the Litani River — some 18 miles north of the Israeli border — as stipulated in a 2006 United Nations Security Council resolution that sought to end the last major cross-border war.

“If the world does not withdraw Hezbollah north of Litani in accordance with Resolution 1701 — Israel will do so,” Katz said on Sunday.

The conflict intensified last week with Israel’s detonation of Hezbollah communication devices in Lebanon and Syria, which Nasrallah described as an “unprecedented blow” for the group.

Two consecutive days of explosions — which killed at least 37 people and wounded 2,931, according to Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad — were followed by the killing of Hezbollah operations chief Ibrahim Aqil and 14 other members in a Beirut airstrike.

The bombing in the Hezbollah-aligned Dahiya suburb killed at least 45 people, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. The dead included at least three children — aged 4, 6 and 10 — and seven women, the ministry said. Dozens more people were wounded.

Hezbollah leaders said they would continue their operations despite last week’s setbacks.

Deputy Secretary General Naim Qasem spoke at Aqil’s funeral in Beirut on Sunday, telling hundreds of mourners that the conflict has now entered “a new phase” which he called an “open-ended battle of reckoning”.

“Threats won’t stop us, and we don’t fear the most dangerous possibilities,” he continued. “We are ready to face all military scenarios.”

Israeli communities in the north of the country are braced for further escalation. The IDF issued new security guidance on Sunday closing schools and beaches in the region, while the Rambam Hospital in Haifa transferred patients to an underground facility.

This weekend, the State Department reissued its level 4 “do not travel” warning for Lebanon, noting “recent explosions throughout Lebanon, including Beirut.”

The Department’s July warning for American citizens to “depart Lebanon while commercial options still remain available” is unchanged. “At this time, commercial flights are available, but at reduced capacity,” the advisory said.

“If the security situation worsens, commercial options to depart may become unavailable.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin “reaffirmed the United States’ commitment to Israel’s right to defend itself and stressed the importance of achieving a diplomatic solution to return citizens to their homes in the north” in a Sunday phone call with Israeli counterpart Yoav Gallant, per a Pentagon readout.

Austin also “emphasized his concern for the safety and security of U.S. citizens in the region,” the Pentagon said.

ABC News’ Dana Savir, Ghazi Balkiz, Joe Simonetti and Morgan Winsor contributed to this report.

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(LONDON) — As Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visits the White House on Thursday, the Biden administration is facing frustration from other western allies over its refusal to let Ukraine use western long-range missiles to strike deeper inside Russia.

The request is a priority for Zelenskyy that he is pressing for this visit, but so far the administration has seemed unyielding in its opposition. That has prompted unusual public expressions of frustration in recent days from some NATO countries.

The prime minister of Denmark, which has been a significant supplier of military aid, this week at the U.N. General Assembly said the public discussion of “red lines” had been a “mistake,” that is “simply giving the Russians too good a card in their hands.”

“It would be really good to stop the delays. And I think that the restrictions on the use of weapons should be lifted,” Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told Bloomberg in a television interview.

Britain and France have both indicated they are ready to allow Ukraine to use their own long-range cruise missiles that they have supplied to hit inside Russia, but want the U.S. to give approval.

U.S. officials have briefed two key reasons for opposing the decision, saying they are concerned it could prompt Russian President Vladimir Putin to further escalate and that the strikes would make insufficient difference to the war, meaning the risk of escalation isn’t worth the military payoff.

Ukraine and some of its other key allies strongly disagree, arguing Putin is bluffing.

Zelenskyy in an interview with ABC News’ Robin Roberts for Good Morning America on Monday said Ukraine could use the missiles to hit airbases that Russia is using to drop hundreds of powerful bombs in eastern Ukraine.

Zelenskyy said he believed Britain, France, Germany and Italy were ready to allow the strikes but that the decision needed to come from the U.S.

“The main role is in the United States, in the president of United States, Biden. Everybody’s looking up to him, and — we need this to defend ourselves,” said Zelenskyy.

Putin has turned to loud nuclear saber-rattling in an effort to deter the U.S. from accepting Ukraine’s request. The Russian leader on Wednesday announced changes to Russia’s nuclear doctrine clearly directed at Ukraine and U.S. The changes said Russia will now treat aggression from non-nuclear states supported by nuclear powers as a “joint attack.”

Putin’s loud threats suggest that the Kremlin at least does not agree with the U.S. assessment that allowing Ukraine to hit targets deeper inside Russia will make little difference to the war.

The U.S. has provided Ukraine with long-range missiles known as ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) that have a range of nearly 190 miles. Amid the debate over whether to let Ukraine use them deeper into Russian territory, Russia has moved back most of its aircraft to bases out of range of the missiles, reducing their potential effectiveness.

Germany, another key ally for Ukraine, though has expressed opposition to supplying its own long-range missiles, despite Ukraine’s requests. Germany’s leader Olaf Scholz this week again reiterated that refusal, saying it is “not compatible with my personal stance … We will not do that.”

Some U.S. political figures have suggested Germany’s opposition is also a concern to the Biden administration.

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