Russian drone strike on Ukraine apartments kills several before Trump-Zelenskyy meet
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(LONDON) — At least seven people, including two children, were killed by a Russian drone strike in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Sunday night, according to local officials.
Serhiy Bolvinov, the head of Kharkiv National Police’s investigations unit, said in a post to Facebook that five Shahed strike drones hit an apartment building at dawn.
“An entire family died in an apartment on the fifth floor,” Bolvinov said.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 140 drones and four missiles in the country overnight into Monday morning, of which 88 drones were shot down or suppressed.
Missile and drone impacts were reported across 25 locations in Donetsk, Kharkiv, Sumy, Dnipropetrovsk, Odesa and Kyiv regions, the air force said.
Zaporizhzhia Gov. Ivan Fedorov said in a post to Telegram that at least three people were killed and at least 20 people injured by missile strikes in the southern region.
The latest attacks come as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy prepares to meet President Donald Trump and a host of European leaders at the White House on Monday, where Trump has said he hopes his Ukrainian counterpart will agree to a deal to end Russia’s war.
Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy’s influential chief of staff, wrote on Telegram of the latest round of strikes, “Russia continues to deliberately kill civilians.”
“That’s why [Russian President Vladimir] Putin doesn’t want to stop the fire — he likes to shell peaceful cities and talk about wanting to end the war,” Yermak wrote. “We don’t see this desire yet.”
Both sides have continued their long-range strike campaigns throughout Trump’s efforts to craft a ceasefire and peace deal to end the conflict, which began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor in February 2022.
Through July, Russia launched a record 6,443 drones and missiles into Ukraine, according to data published by the Ukrainian air force, with a daily average of 201 drones and six missiles.
July’s monthly total was the highest of the war to date, and around 13% more than were recorded in June.
At least 286 people were killed and 1,388 injured in Ukraine in July, making last month the deadliest for Ukrainian civilians since May 2022, according to data published by the United Nations’ Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine.
So far in August, the scale of Russian strikes has diminished. As of Monday, Ukraine’s air force had recorded 1,344 drone and 27 missile launches by Russia in August — an average of around 74 drones and more than one missile per day so far this month.
Russia’s Defense Ministry, meanwhile, has claimed to have shot down 1,740 Ukrainian drones so far in August, at a daily average of around 96 per day.
The Defense Ministry in Moscow said its forces downed at least 24 Ukrainian drones overnight into Monday.
(LONDON) — Police in France say that 14 people have been arrested after 145 people reported being ‘pricked’, possibly by syringes, at a nationwide music festival on Saturday.
Most of the victims were women and the attacks happened during France’s annual “Festival of Music” — Fête de la Musique — which is a series of musical events in towns and cities across the country.
The 145 people who were either pricked, or believe they were pricked, were typically attacked when they were in a crowd and were pricked either in the arm or the back, police say. Most of the victims didn’t see their attacker.
Victims reported feeling an array of symptoms such as hot flushes, dizziness, loss of consciousness and visible marks or bruises on their skin.
Some victims were treated by medics at the festival, but some were taken to hospital where they gave saliva, urine and blood samples to detect whether they had been injected with substances, according to police.
It is not yet clear whether substances have been detected following those tests.
In a video posted on X on Monday evening, French police said they have so far arrested 14 suspects in connection with the attacks.
French police are now warning people attending future events to be vigilant and to seek help immediately if they feel any symptoms. They have also urged people to contact the police and visit a hospital to be tested for any potential substances.
Just before the Festival of Music, a French feminist influencer had posted on social media warning women that men were threatening to prick people during Saturday’s nationwide event in France.
The investigation into the incident is currently ongoing.
(LONDON) — Hamas said it has submitted a response to the latest ceasefire proposal by U.S. Middle East Envoy Steve Witkoff to mediators on Saturday, reiterating its key demands.
Hamas’ key demands are “to achieve a permanent ceasefire, a complete withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and ensure the continuous flow of humanitarian aid,” according to the group.
The group’s demands remain the same as in previous ceasefire negotiations.
Hamas said its hostage exchange proposal would involve the release of 10 living hostages and the bodies of 18 dead hostages, in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(GAZA STRIP) — After almost three months of a total aid blockade in Gaza and intensified attacks from Israel, children are suffering the most severe consequences, a local doctor says, from death and injuries to starvation.
A senior Palestinian pediatric doctor described the humanitarian crisis in Gaza as “unbelievable,” witnessing children dying from hunger and preventable injuries, scenes he said he had studied in textbooks, but never imagined seeing in real life.
In an interview with ABC News this week, Dr. Ahmmed Al-Farra, head of pediatrics and maternity in Gaza’s Nasser Medical Complex, said hospitals are collapsing across the region.
No public hospitals are operating in the north of the strip and Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, once the largest hospital in southern Gaza, has repeatedly been targeted by Israeli airstrikes.
Al-Farra said that many patients have died on the operating table due to a lack of essential equipment and medication. “If a patient in North Gaza has chest pain or is injured, he will lose his life,” said Al-Farra. “All the hospitals there are gone: Shifa, Kamal Adwan, the Indonesian Hospital. Destroyed or inoperable.”
He paints a devastating picture of life in Gaza, over 19 months into the war. “We’re seeing children with marasmus — skin and bone,” he said. “Some are just 40% of their expected weight. Severe malnutrition, no protein, no vitamins.”
Marasmus is a form of severe malnutrition characterized by protein-energy deficiency, caused by insufficient calorie intake leading to severe fat and muscle loss, according to the National Institutes of Health. While it can occur in anyone with severe malnutrition, it usually occurs in children.
Siwar Ashour, a child in Gaza, was born small, but was a relatively healthy baby six months ago, according to Al-Farra.
But today, she is acutely malnourished and fighting for her life in the Nasser Hospital, the doctor said. The facility has been repeatedly bombed by Israel, including attacks on Monday. Israel Defense Forces officials say they are targeting terrorists hiding there.
Siwar is bound in plastic, according to Al-Farra. The doctor says her weight loss is so severe that she can no longer regulate her own body temperature. And at 6 months old, she weighs just over 7 pounds. That is less than half the weight of an average American baby girl, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
“If she does not take the suitable formula of milk, unfortunately, she will not survive,” Al-Farra said.
Nearly 500,000 people in Gaza are facing catastrophic hunger, according to a report released by 17 UN agencies and NGOs. Israeli officials have disputed the agency’s figures and say their warnings have been wrong in the past.
Detailing the only option that his colleagues have in hospitals to fight the severe malnutrition in children, Al-Farra said that Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), or Doctors Without Borders, has managed to provide small amounts of emergency baby formula, known as F-75 and F-100, to treat acute malnutrition in babies.
The doctor, however, said children’s conditions often deteriorate again after being discharged from the hospital. “We give the children a bit of formula — F-75, F-100 — from MSF, just in the hospital,” he explained. “They get a little better, and then we have to send them home, because we need the bed for the next child. But outside, there’s no food, no milk, no protein. They come back a week later, worse than before.”
Al-Farra also highlighted the widespread hunger afflicting Palestinians of all ages and all walks of life in Gaza, now 11 weeks into Israel’s ban on humanitarian aid entering the strip. Even as a doctor with a relatively stable income, he said he has gone without fresh meat, chicken and fish for over three months. “I haven’t had any chicken or meat protein in the past three months. … If this is my reality, imagine what it’s like for the people in the streets,” he said.
Following repeated international warnings on the catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza, Israel allowed five trucks of aid to enter the territory on Monday, according to COGAT, the Israeli Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories. A top Israeli official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the aid trucks contained flour, baby food, medical supplies and staples for central kitchens in Gaza.
Israel says they imposed the humanitarian aid blockade on March 2 to put pressure on Hamas to release the remaining hostages. The temporary ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas ended on March 1. The ceasefire fully collapsed on March 18 when Israel resumed military operations in Gaza.
Israel on Sunday agreed to allow a “basic” amount of food into Gaza, saying it didn’t want a “starvation crisis.”
Israel allowed 100 aid trucks to enter Gaza on Tuesday, UN OCHA Deputy Spokesperson Jens Laerke said. But no aid has been distributed in Gaza yet, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said during his daily briefing from UN Headquarters in New York Tuesday.
The amount of aid was described as “a drop in the ocean” by the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, UNOCHA.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the decision to allow in aid came after pressure from U.S. lawmakers.
The war between Israel and Hamas broke out on October 7, 2023, when Hamas terrorist fighters entered Israel and killed 1,200 people and kidnapped 251 hostages. There are still 58 hostages held captive by Hamas, 20 of whom are presumed to be alive. Hamas is believed to be holding the bodies of four Americans.
The war has taken a large toll on Palestinians, with over 53,000 killed since October 7, 2023, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health. While statistics do not distinguish between military and non-military casualties, women and children make up tens of thousands of this number, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.
Highlighting the dire situation of the survivors of the war in Gaza, especially children, Al-Farra pleaded for immediate aid coming into the strip. “We’re not asking for miracles. We’re asking for food, for medicine,” he said. “They are not numbers on paper — they are human beings created by God. They have the right to survive.”
ABC News’ Lama Hasan, Samy Zyara, Diaa Ostaz and Jordana Miller contributed to this report
