Russia carries out ‘massive strike’ on Ukraine, killing at least 4 and injuring 26
Yurii Tynnyi/Suspilne Ukraine/JSC “UA:PBC”/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — Russia carried out a massive aerial attack across central and eastern Ukraine overnight, killing at least four people and injuring 26 others, according to Ukrainian authorities.
The Ukrainian Air Force said in a Telegram post Saturday morning that Russia overnight had launched 503 projectiles — 458 drones and 45 missiles — of which 415 were shot down while the remaining 78 struck 25 different locations across Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a Telegram post Saturday morning that the targets of the latest Russian strikes “remain the same: ordinary life, residential buildings, our energy system, and infrastructure.”
The city of Dnipro was hit hard, with three people killed and another 11 injured there, according to the regional military administration, which said children were among the casualties. A drone struck an apartment building in the city. Three more were injured in the nearby Samarskyi district of the wider Dnipropetrovsk region, authorities said.
In the Kharkiv region, at least one person was killed in the village of Rokytne; eight others were injured in the suburbs of Kharkiv city; one person was injured in nearby Chuhuiv; and another was injured in the village of Hrushivka, according to the regional military administration. The mayor of Kharkiv said in a Telegram post Saturday morning that the city is facing a significant electricity shortage.
Additionally, one person was injured in the Poltava region and another person was injured in the neighboring Kyiv region, according to the respective regional military administrations. The strikes on the Poltava region targeted energy infrastructure facilities, cutting off electricity, water and heating to some communities, authorities said.
The Russian strikes mark the ninth large-scale attack on Ukraine’s gas infrastructure since the start of October, according to Ukrainian state-run energy firm Naftogaz, which in a Telegram post Saturday morning accused Russian of deliberately “targeting enterprises that provide Ukrainians with gas and heat” during the winter months.
The Russian Ministry of Defense confirmed in a Telegram post Saturday morning that it had targeted Ukrainian military and energy infrastructure in an overnight attack. The “massive strike” was carried out in response to “Ukraine’s terrorist attacks on civilian targets in Russia,” according to the Russian defense ministry.
Smoke rises from the area following an Israeli attack on former Social Development building on August 13, 2025 in Rafah, Gaza. Photo by Ali Jadallah/Anadolu via Getty Images
(LONDON) — Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Eyal Zamir on Wednesday approved “the main framework for the IDF’s operational plan in the Gaza Strip,” according to an IDF spokesperson.
“As part of the discussion, IDF operations to date were presented, including an attack in the Zeitoun area that began yesterday,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
“The central concept for the plan for the next stages in the Gaza Strip was presented and approved, in accordance with the directive of the political echelon,” the spokesperson added.
Last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his security cabinet approved plans for the IDF to seize and occupy Gaza City — the strip’s largest urban area — as part of an expanded military operation to “demilitarize” the strip and remove Hamas from power.
The operation would force the IDF to operate in areas where Israel believes Hamas is holding living hostages.
Netanyahu set out “five principles” for the end of the war.
“One, Hamas disarmed. Second, all hostages freed. Third, Gaza demilitarized. Fourth, Israel has overriding security control. And five, non-Israeli, peaceful civil administration — by that I mean a civilian administration that doesn’t educate its children for terror, that doesn’t pay terrorists and doesn’t launch terrorist attacks against Israel.”
Netanyahu’s plans to expand the war have been sharply criticized by the families of the hostages who call it a death sentence for their loved ones. Israel believes 20 hostages are still alive in Hamas captivity — the terror group is also holding the bodies of 30 killed hostages.
Hospitals across Gaza recorded 123 deaths and 437 injuries over the previous 24 hours, Gaza’s Hamas-run Ministry of Health said Wednesday.
Among the dead were 21 people killed while trying to collect humanitarian aid, the ministry said, while another 185 people were injured.
Eight deaths due to hunger were also recorded across Gaza, the ministry said on Wednesday.
ABC News’ Morgan Winsor and Diaa Ostaz contributed to this report.
Displaced Palestinians flock to an aid distribution point set up in the Netzarim Corridor in hopes of receiving limited humanitarian aid in Deir al Balah, Gaza on August 08, 2025/ (Photo by Hassan Jedi/Anadolu via Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Some U.S. citizens who are victims and family members of victims of Hamas and Hezbollah attacks have filed a lawsuit against the largest U.N. agency that provides humanitarian assistance for Palestinians, accusing the aid organization of promoting terrorism.
Filed in a Washington, D.C., district court last week, the lawsuit targets the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) and its U.S.-based non-profit, UNRWA USA, which is based in Washington, D.C.
The 200 plaintiffs accuse UNRWA of violating antiterrorism laws by allegedly providing funds and other methods of support to Hamas and Hezbollah, which are classified by the State Department as foreign terrorist organizations. They also accuse the agency of employing staff who they say were directly involved in terror attacks.
In a press release, UNRWA slammed the lawsuit as “meritless, absurd, dangerous, and morally reprehensible.”
“Both UNRWA and UNRWA USA’s missions are legal, moral, and humanitarian,” the organization said in the statement. It called the allegations “misinformation to dismantle a life-saving institution precisely because of its central role in keeping Palestinian refugees and the hope of Palestinian freedom and self-determination alive.”
One of the plaintiffs, the Mathias-Troen family, is suing on behalf of Shachar Deborah Troen Mathias and his wife, Shlomi David Mathias, who were “heinously murdered” by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, according to the lawsuit. In addition to their deaths, the couple’s son was physically injured, prompting 12 family members to seek reparations for the “severe mental anguish and extreme emotional pain and suffering” they endured.
While many of the allegations center around Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack in Israel, some plaintiffs are also seeking compensation for attacks that occurred years prior.
“This is a case seeking justice and accountability against an entity that holds itself out as ‘humanitarian’ but which has utterly failed in its mission and purpose while unconscionably providing material support for terror,” Richard D. Heideman, lead counsel for the plaintiffs, said in a statement to ABC News.
Samuel Silverman, counsel for all plaintiffs, told ABC News that the lawsuit is about putting an end to the “foster[ing of] a culture of terrorism.”
The plaintiffs seek unspecified compensatory and punitive damages, with Heideman telling ABC News that they demand payment for “any judgment for which [the defendants] are found liable.”
A similar lawsuit was filed in New York last year, where noncitizen victims and their families accused UNRWA of assisting Hamas during the Oct. 7 attack, citing alleged instances in which they say UNRWA employed Hamas members, contributed to the construction of Hamas military centers, and held Israeli hostages, among other allegations.
UNRWA USA called this a “baseless lawsuit,” filing a motion to dismiss the case.
“This legal attack is not just on UNRWA USA but on millions of Palestine refugees who rely on its funding for critical needs like food, water, and medical care,” they said in a statement.
The agency argued that it should be immune from litigation because it is a subsidiary organ of the U.N.
As a subsidiary of the U.N., the Biden administration supported UNRWA having immunity from civil liability, which protected the agency from this legal action. But the Trump administration’s Justice Department reversed this stance in April, issuing a letter to the judge overseeing the case that said the prior administration’s stance on the matter was “wrong.”
“Previously, the Government expressed the view that certain immunities shielded UNRWA from having to answer those allegations in American courts. The Government has since reevaluated that position, and now concludes UNRWA is not immune from this litigation,” the letter read.
Silverman called this reversal “a real step in the right direction” and emphasized the need to “support victims of terrorism,” which he believes to be “bipartisan.”
“This lawsuit is sort of going to be novel, as we’ve seen by the two positions that the Justice Department has taken,” he said of the 2025 lawsuit, expressing his confidence in the case.
Outside of the courts, the Trump administration has determined that UNRWA as an organization is “compromised” and should be “dismantled.”
“We can confirm the Administration has determined UNRWA is irredeemably compromised and now seeks its full dismantlement,” a State Department spokesperson told ABC News on Tuesday.
Earlier this year, Trump signed an executive order demanding “renewed scrutiny” for UNRWA, particularly regarding its role in Oct. 7, citing reports that the agency was “infiltrated” by members of foreign terrorist organizations.
In a January interview with ABC News, Director of UNRWA’s DC office, Bill Deere, promised that “every allegation that is brought to our attention with information gets investigated.”
UNRWA previously acknowledged possible wrongdoing in the Oct. 7 attack, terminating nine U.N. employees last summer for potential involvement in the attacks after an investigation led by the U.N.’s Office of Internal Oversight Services.
The Biden administration paused UNRWA funding in January 2024 in light of these allegations and the subsequent investigation. The funding remains frozen today, despite multiple congressional efforts to restore it.
“Without the US government’s full financial support, UNRWA’s ability to continue its life-saving work for Palestine refugees at the scale needed, including in Gaza will be in jeopardy,” UNRWA USA said in a statement in March.
According to an UNRWA report released last Friday, food parcels ran out “several weeks ago,” and “no UNRWA supplies entered the Gaza Strip” since March.
The largest U.N. agency operating in Gaza, UNRWA was established in 1949 as a “subsidiary organ” of the UN General Assembly, with operations commencing a year later.
“UNRWA provides humanitarian assistance and contributes to protection of refugees through essential service delivery, primarily in the areas of basic education, primary health care and mental health care, relief and social services, microcredit, and emergency assistance, including in situations of armed conflict, to millions of registered Palestine refugees located within its five fields of operations (Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza),” their mandate says.
Deere also told ABC News that UNRWA “represents most of the U.N. staff, the facilities, the expertise and supporting infrastructure for the response in Gaza.”
In 2021, UNRWA said the U.S. was their “largest donor with a total contribution of over US$338 million across all UNRWA funding portals.” They have also referred to the U.S. as one of their “most reliable supporters.”
The police investigation continues at the scene near Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation synagogue in Crumpsall, Manchester, where two people died in a terror attack. Picture date: Friday October 3, 2025. (Photo by Peter Byrne/PA Images via Getty Images)
(LONDON) — Two of the Manchester synagogue attack victims appeared to been shot by police officers who were trying to stop the assailant, the Greater Manchester Police said Friday.
One of the victims with apparent gunshot wounds died during the attack and the other remains hospitalized, police said.
“The Home Office Pathologist has advised that he has provisionally determined, that one of the deceased victims would appear to have suffered a wound consistent with a gunshot injury,” Police Chief Constable Stephen Watson said in a statement.
Police said they determined the victims who were shot were likely hit by police because the suspect — who was fatally shot by police — was not in possession of any firearms, according to their initial investigation.
Police alleged that Jihad Al-Shamie, 35, a British citizen of Syrian descent, drove a vehicle into a crowd outside the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue early on Thursday. He then allegedly exited the vehicle and began attacking people with a blade — actions that police said were a terrorist incident.
As the attack unfolded, congregants blockaded themselves inside the synagogue, keeping Al-Shamie outside. He was then struck and killed by police gunfire, officials said.
Both of those who appeared to have been struck by law enforcement were believed to have been sheltering inside the synagogue, where they were “close together” behind a door as “worshippers acted bravely to prevent the attacker from gaining entry,” police said.
Police earlier on Friday said in a statement that they had identified the two victims killed during the attack as Adrian Daulby, 53, and Melvin Cravitz, 66, both of whom were from Crumpsall.
Law enforcement did not immediately say which of the victims appeared to have been hit by gunfire. The victim who was shot and injured was one of three who were receiving treatment for injuries in local hospitals, police said on Friday.
Three additional suspects — two men and a woman — were also taken into custody and arrested on suspicion of commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism, police said on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Al-Shamie’s family released a statement condemning “this heinous act, which targeted peaceful, innocent civilians.”
“We fully distance ourselves from this attack and express our deep shock and sorrow over what has happened,” the family said. “Our hearts and thoughts are with the victims and their families, and we pray for their strength and comfort.”
