Ukraine attacks a naval facility and oil terminal in St. Petersburg as Putin’s “Davos” begins

The Russia-Ukraine war is now in its fifth year, and it remains one of the most consequential conflicts of the 21st century. What began as Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor in February 2022 has evolved into a grinding war of attrition — fought with tanks and trenches as much as with drones, long-range missiles, sanctions, and diplomacy. As of September 2026, the war continues on the battlefield even as renewed US-led diplomacy tries to find a path to peace. This page brings together the latest developments, the key military and diplomatic threads, and the historical context needed to understand where things stand — and where they might go next. It is updated regularly as the situation evolves. Russia-Ukraine War: Current Situation More than four and a half years after Russia’s invasion, the front line in eastern and southern Ukraine has shifted only gradually in recent months. Independent monitors tracking territorial control describe Russian advances as slow and costly, measured in single-digit square miles per month rather than sweeping breakthroughs, even as fighting remains intense in the Donetsk region and along other parts of the roughly 1,000-kilometer front. Away from the front line, the war has increasingly been fought through the air. Both sides regularly exchange long-range drone and missile strikes — Russia targeting Ukrainian cities and energy infrastructure, and Ukraine striking Russian oil refineries, drone-storage sites, and military-industrial targets deep inside Russian territory. At the same time, diplomacy has re-accelerated. In early September 2026, US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner traveled first to Moscow to meet President Vladimir Putin and then to Kyiv to meet President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, carrying a renewed American proposal to end the war. Ukraine briefly paused strikes on Moscow around the visit, and Russia held off strikes on Kyiv, in a gesture of goodwill — but officials on both sides cautioned that a comprehensive deal remained elusive, with territorial questions still unresolved. In short: the war has not ended, but active, high-level diplomatic engagement is underway alongside continued fighting. How the War Started — Background and Timeline 2014–2022: The Origins The current war has roots that stretch back to 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine following the ouster of Ukraine’s pro-Russian president, and Russian-backed separatists seized parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine (together known as the Donbas). A low-intensity conflict in the Donbas continued for the next eight years, alongside repeated but unsuccessful diplomatic efforts, including the Minsk agreements, to reach a lasting settlement. February 2022: Full-Scale Invasion On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, sending forces across the border from the north, east, and south, including an assault on the capital, Kyiv. Russia’s stated goals included preventing Ukraine’s membership in NATO and asserting influence over what it described as historically Russian territory. Ukraine, backed rapidly by Western military and financial support, mounted a defense that repelled the assault on Kyiv within weeks. 2022–2024: Shifting Front Lines Ukraine launched successful counteroffensives in the second half of 2022, retaking territory around Kharkiv and the city of Kherson. Russia responded by annexing four partially occupied Ukrainian regions — Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson — in a move not recognized by most of the international community. A major Ukrainian counteroffensive in 2023 made only limited territorial gains against heavily fortified Russian defenses. In November 2024, Russia used its new Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile in combat for the first time, striking the city of Dnipro. 2025–2026: War of Attrition and Renewed Diplomacy Through 2025 and into 2026, the war settled into a costly war of attrition, marked by incremental Russian territorial gains, intensifying long-range strikes by both sides, and repeated but inconclusive rounds of diplomacy. The Trump administration made ending the war a top foreign policy priority, leading to the emergence of a detailed US-brokered peace framework in late 2025 and a series of high-level negotiating rounds continuing into September 2026. Peace Talks and Negotiations The US-Brokered Peace Plan In November 2025, details emerged of a US-drafted peace proposal — often referred to as the 28-point plan — developed by envoy Steve Witkoff with input from Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Jared Kushner. According to reporting on the draft, its key elements included: The original draft drew sharp criticism from Ukrainian and European officials, who described several provisions as effectively rewarding Russian aggression and requiring Kyiv to make concessions it had long rejected. European leaders, including from France and the UK, proposed amendments — such as ruling out permanent NATO troop stationing in Ukraine while preserving other security commitments — and a revised, shorter version of the plan has been under discussion since. Witkoff–Kushner Shuttle Diplomacy (September 2026) In early September 2026, Witkoff and Kushner traveled to Moscow for roughly three hours of talks with Putin, followed by a trip to Kyiv to meet Zelenskyy and European allies. Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov described the Moscow talks as “useful” and “constructive,” while a source involved in the Kyiv meetings said negotiators aimed to develop a “refreshed” peace proposal. Kushner also signaled a US preference for returning to a “trilateral” negotiating format involving the US, Russia, and Ukraine directly, a format used in earlier rounds of talks. No breakthrough or signed agreement resulted from this round of shuttle diplomacy. Officials on both sides described the discussions as constructive but acknowledged that core disagreements — particularly over territory — remain unresolved. Key Sticking Points Ceasefire Efforts and Limited Truces Full nationwide ceasefires have so far proven elusive. However, both sides have periodically agreed to narrow, short-term measures — such as brief mutual pauses on long-range strikes against Moscow and Kyiv around diplomatic visits, or localized truces to allow prisoner exchanges or repair of critical infrastructure. Earlier in the peace process, Ukraine indicated it was prepared to accept a 30-day ceasefire proposal, with US officials at the time saying “the ball is now in Russia’s court.” Russia has not agreed to a comprehensive ceasefire, and fighting along the front line and aerial strikes on both sides have continued largely uninterrupted through these episodes. Military Developments Russia’s Military Position Russian forces continue to press offensives primarily in the Donetsk region, making gradual territorial gains at a high cost in personnel and equipment, according to open-source monitoring groups. Russian officials have publicly argued that Ukraine’s economy and military capacity are being steadily worn down, while Western and Ukrainian assessments emphasize that Russia’s own economic and manpower base is under mounting strain, even as it retains the capacity to continue fighting into 2027 and beyond absent a settlement. Ukraine’s Military Position Ukraine has shifted increasingly toward a defense strategy that combines holding fortified front-line positions with long-range strikes deep into Russian territory — hitting oil refineries, drone-production and storage sites, and military logistics hubs more than 1,000 kilometers from the border in some cases. Ukraine has also significantly expanded its domestic defense industry; Ukrainian officials stated in early 2026 that the country was producing more than half of the weapons systems it uses, with a defense production capacity estimated at around $55 billion for the year. The Oreshnik Missile The Oreshnik is a Russian-developed intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM), a weapons class banned for decades under a Cold War-era US-Soviet treaty that both countries abandoned in 2019. Russia first used it in combat against Dnipro in November 2024. Moscow has claimed the missile can carry multiple warheads traveling at hypersonic speeds and is difficult to intercept; independent analysts have been more skeptical of some of these claims, describing the strikes partly as a show of force. Russia has since deployed Oreshnik systems to Belarus and, along with Belarusian forces, has conducted joint exercises practicing its deployment. Drone and Missile Warfare Aerial warfare has become one of the defining features of the conflict’s later years. Russian Strikes on Ukraine Russia regularly launches large combined waves of drones and missiles at Ukrainian cities, sometimes numbering in the hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles in a single night. These strikes have targeted government and security buildings, residential areas, and — especially during the winter months — the country’s electricity and heating infrastructure. Ukrainian Strikes on Russia Ukraine has built up its own long-range drone capability, striking oil refineries, fuel depots, drone-storage and launch sites, and other military-industrial targets across multiple Russian regions. Ukrainian officials have said this campaign is intended to raise the economic and military cost of the war for Moscow. Russian officials have said Ukrainian strikes have themselves cost the Russian economy a measurable share of GDP. Energy Infrastructure Under Fire Attacks on Ukraine’s Grid Since 2022, Russia has carried out dozens of large-scale coordinated strikes on Ukraine’s power plants, substations, and gas facilities, part of what Ukrainian officials have called a campaign of “energy terror.” The winter of 2025–2026 was described by Ukrainian officials and analysts as among the hardest of the war: Ukraine’s available electricity generation capacity, once around 55 gigawatts before the war, had fallen to roughly 11–17 gigawatts by early 2026, forcing rolling blackouts across the country during periods of severe cold. In response, Ukraine has increasingly pursued smaller, distributed and harder-to-target power generation as a long-term resilience strategy. Attacks on Russian Refineries In a mirrored campaign, Ukraine has repeatedly struck Russian oil refineries and energy infrastructure, aiming to disrupt fuel supplies for the Russian military and reduce the export revenue that helps fund the war. Russia’s Defense Ministry has, at times, framed its own strikes on Ukrainian energy sites as retaliation for these Ukrainian attacks. NATO, the US, and Western Military Support NATO’s Role NATO has not deployed combat forces to Ukraine, which is not a member of the alliance, but it has served as a central coordinating body for Western military assistance, intelligence sharing, and training. NATO members have also increased their own defense posture along the alliance’s eastern flank in response to the war and to Russian military activity in and around Belarus. The PURL Program and Weapons Aid In 2025, the United States and NATO launched the Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List (PURL) — a mechanism through which NATO allies and partners pay for American-made weapons, munitions, and equipment that the US then delivers to Ukraine. By mid-2026, dozens of countries had contributed several billion dollars to PURL, funding more than ten weapons packages, including the large majority of Patriot air-defense interceptors reaching Ukraine. Separately, the US has continued limited Foreign Military Financing and sales support, though officials in Europe have expressed concern at times about funding gaps and competing US military priorities elsewhere in the world affecting the pace of deliveries. Sanctions on Russia How Sanctions Work Sanctions on Russia have primarily taken three forms: asset freezes and travel bans on individuals and entities; blocking sanctions that cut companies off from the US or EU financial systems (in the US, this means being added to the Treasury’s Specially Designated Nationals, or SDN, list); and sector-wide trade restrictions, such as bans on importing Russian oil, gas, or other goods. Latest Sanctions Measures In October 2025, the United States, United Kingdom, and European Union coordinated a significant escalation of sanctions targeting Russia’s energy sector. The US Treasury added Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil, to its SDN list, alongside dozens of their subsidiaries. The UK imposed asset-freeze sanctions on the same companies. The EU adopted its 19th sanctions package, which for the first time included a ban on imports of Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) — phased in between April 2026 and January 2027 depending on contract type — along with tightened restrictions on Rosneft and Gazprom Neft and new designations of tankers, financial institutions, and third-country entities accused of helping Russia evade sanctions. Ukraine’s Own Sanctions Ukraine has separately imposed its own sanctions regime targeting Russian officials, companies, and individuals it accuses of supporting the invasion, war crimes, or sanctions evasion, coordinating in many cases with its Western partners’ designations. Belarus and Nuclear Concerns Belarus, which borders both Russia and Ukraine as well as NATO members Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia, has served as a staging ground and close military partner for Russia throughout the war. Since 2025, Russia has stationed tactical nuclear weapons and Oreshnik missile systems on Belarusian territory, with Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko citing perceived threats from neighboring NATO states. Russia and Belarus have conducted joint military exercises — including the large-scale Zapad drills — that have explicitly included planning for the potential use of non-strategic nuclear weapons and the deployment of Oreshnik systems. NATO and Polish officials have expressed concern that such exercises, held close to the alliance’s borders, could at times serve as cover for broader military activity. Belarusian opposition figures have criticized the nuclear posture, arguing it turns the country into a target rather than a source of security. Diplomatic Relations and Key Players The diplomatic landscape involves several key actors: What Could Happen Next Several scenarios remain plausible as of September 2026:

An Amazon cargo plane ran off a runway at Miami International Airport on Sunday, killing at least five people and injuring five others as it struck vehicles and caught fire, authorities said. The aircraft overran the runway around 2 p.m. after arriving from San Juan, Puerto Rico, and crossed a road used by warehouse workers and other businesses surrounding the airport. Five people died, three were critically injured and two others were hospitalized with less severe injuries, Miami-Dade County officials said at a news conference. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the pilots survived or whether those killed were all in vehicles when the plane struck. The crash sent thick black smoke into the sky and trapped the pilot and copilot in the cockpit, along with some occupants of nearby cars, Miami-Dade Rescue Fire Chief Ray Jadallah said. Crews also had to free a person trapped under a vehicle, according to the department. The crash halted flights at the busy airport for much of the afternoon. About 200 emergency personnel responded and found the plane engulfed in heavy flames and smoke from an engine compartment fire, the fire department said. Firefighters used foam from specialized airport firefighting units to put out the blaze, and crews were still dealing with a fuel leak hours later. The Prime Air plane came to rest beside a roadway near two semitrucks, images showed. The aircraft appeared to be resting on its belly and was largely intact despite the fire. A 32-Year-Old Boeing 767 The flight was operated by 21 Air, a cargo carrier based in North Carolina. The Boeing 767, which is 32 years old, was originally built to carry passengers and flew for several airlines for more than two decades before it was converted into a cargo plane in 2015, according to flight-tracking site Flightradar24. More than 160 flights were canceled and nearly 325 delayed by late Sunday, according to FlightAware, a site that tracks flight disruptions. Officials at Orlando International Airport, more than 200 miles north of Miami, said some flights were diverted there. The National Transportation Safety Board said it was sending a team to Miami, led by Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy, to investigate. Amazon said in a statement that it would cooperate with any investigation. “We’re heartbroken to learn that five people lost their lives in today’s incident at Miami International Airport,” the company said. “Our deepest sympathies go out to the families, loved ones, and all those affected by this devastating loss.” A Second Cargo Crash In Two Years Last year, a UPS plane crashed after losing an engine while accelerating down the runway at Louisville’s Muhammad Ali International Airport. That crash killed all three pilots on board and 12 people on the ground, and injured 23 more. Aviation safety expert Steve Arroyo said a 767 cargo aircraft would typically be staffed by just a pilot and copilot on domestic flights. A third pilot would be added for an international flight, and a fourth would be required for a long-haul international route. Arroyo, a retired longtime United Airlines pilot, said he wants to know whether the Amazon plane landed within the runway’s touchdown zone, and if it landed beyond that zone, why the crew didn’t abort and go around for another attempt. The touchdown zone is typically within the first 3,000 feet of a runway. “Did the aircraft land within the required touchdown zone?” Arroyo asked. “If it did, what happened?” Video Shows Plane ‘Floating’ Above The Runway Mary Schiavo, a pilot and former inspector general of the Transportation Department, said video of the landing posted online shows the Amazon plane floating above the runway for an extended period without the nose flaring upward to force the main landing gear onto the ground. “It didn’t touch down right away, and so it lost a lot of critical real estate by just continuing to float over the runway. It was literally still flying,” Schiavo said. She noted that Miami International Airport does not have the arresting systems the FAA says have been installed at more than 120 airports nationwide to safely stop planes that overrun a runway. Those systems use beds of lightweight, crushable material at the end of a runway, and the FAA credits them with helping save at least 497 lives aboard planes that ran past runway ends. How Runway Overruns Typically Unfold A runway overrun happens when an aircraft either lands beyond the intended touchdown point or fails to stop before reaching the end of the available pavement, often due to excess speed, a delayed touchdown, wet or contaminated runway surfaces, or mechanical issues that prevent effective braking. Investigators in cases like Sunday’s crash typically examine flight data recorder information, cockpit voice recordings, weather conditions at the time of landing, and the aircraft’s approach speed and glide path in the moments before touchdown. The questions raised by Arroyo and Schiavo point toward two of the most common lines of inquiry in overrun investigations: whether the aircraft touched down within the zone engineered for safe stopping distance, and whether the crew had the option to abort the landing and circle back before running out of runway. Go-around procedures exist specifically to give pilots an exit when a landing doesn’t develop as planned, and investigators will likely examine why that option wasn’t used, if it was available. Airport Safety Infrastructure Under Scrutiny The absence of an arresting system at Miami International Airport is likely to draw additional attention as the NTSB investigation proceeds. The FAA-credited systems, known as engineered material arrestor systems, are designed to stop aircraft using crushable material rather than relying solely on the length of the paved runway strip. They have been installed at over 120 U.S. airports, particularly those where runway safety areas are constrained by nearby roads, water, or terrain, similar to the road that Sunday’s plane crossed after leaving the runway. Sunday’s crash marks the second major U.S. cargo plane accident involving fatalities in roughly a year, following the UPS crash in Louisville. Both incidents have renewed scrutiny of cargo carrier safety practices, though investigators have not yet indicated any connection between the two events beyond the fact that both involved large cargo aircraft during takeoff or landing phases. The NTSB investigation, led by Homendy, will examine the aircraft’s maintenance history, the crew’s qualifications and flight history, air traffic control communications, and physical evidence from the crash site. Findings from such investigations typically take months to more than a year to finalize, though the agency sometimes issues preliminary reports or urgent safety recommendations well before a final report is complete if investigators identify an immediate risk to other aircraft.

U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner held “encouraging” talks in Kyiv on Sunday, their first official visit to Ukraine, but the meeting produced no breakthrough toward ending Russia’s full-scale invasion. The visit is part of a renewed push by the Trump administration to end the war. It came a day after Witkoff and Kushner met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow. Both trips took place as Russia and Ukraine have escalated aerial attacks on each other in a war that has now run more than four and a half years. The Trump administration’s diplomatic effort to end the fighting had lost momentum in recent months, with U.S. attention centered on the Iran war for the past six months. The Kyiv and Moscow meetings mark an attempt to bring Ukraine back into sharper focus. Despite the fresh round of diplomacy, the core demands of Moscow and Kyiv remain mutually exclusive, particularly over territorial concessions. That gap underscores how difficult reaching an agreement will be, even with senior American officials now shuttling between the two capitals. Kushner acknowledged the scale of the challenge after the Kyiv talks. “It’s a very, very hard problem, but we’re going to try,” he said, adding that the U.S. was working “behind the scenes” to create the conditions for a possible deal. A Renewed Push After Months On The Back Burner Witkoff has served as one of Trump’s most active envoys since the start of the administration, taking on negotiating roles across several of the president’s foreign policy priorities. Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and a senior adviser during his first term, has also been drawn into the effort to broker an end to the war. Sunday’s trip marked the first time either envoy had traveled to Ukraine in an official capacity, a notable shift after months in which the administration’s diplomatic bandwidth was consumed by the confrontation with Iran. That conflict, which began in February with U.S. and Israeli strikes, has dominated the White House’s foreign policy agenda and left less room for sustained attention on Ukraine. With the Iran war continuing to simmer, including recent tanker strikes and threats of further retaliation in the Gulf, the decision to send Witkoff and Kushner to both Moscow and Kyiv within a single weekend signals an attempt to restart momentum on Ukraine without waiting for the Iran situation to fully resolve. Territorial Demands Remain The Central Obstacle The trip followed Saturday’s meeting with Putin in Moscow, where the Russian president has consistently tied any settlement to Ukrainian territorial concessions, including recognition of Russian control over areas it has occupied since the invasion began in February 2022. Kyiv has just as consistently rejected ceding territory as a precondition for peace, insisting instead on security guarantees and a return to something closer to its pre-invasion borders. That divide has shaped every prior round of negotiations over the course of the war and shows no sign of narrowing. Kushner’s description of the effort as “very, very hard” reflects an acknowledgment, unusual in its bluntness for an active negotiator, that the fundamental positions of the two sides have not moved closer together despite the renewed diplomatic activity. Fighting Continues To Escalate On Both Sides The diplomatic trips came against a backdrop of intensifying violence rather than a lull that might typically accompany a serious peace push. Both Russia and Ukraine have stepped up aerial attacks in recent weeks, striking deeper and more frequently than in earlier phases of the war. The continued escalation illustrates the disconnect between the diplomatic track, now involving direct engagement from two of Trump’s closest envoys, and the battlefield, where neither side has shown willingness to de-escalate ahead of or during talks. That pattern has recurred throughout the war: periods of diplomatic activity have rarely coincided with reduced fighting, and this weekend’s shuttle diplomacy appears to be no exception. What Comes Next Neither Witkoff nor Kushner outlined a specific timeline or framework following the Kyiv talks. Kushner’s description of the work as happening “behind the scenes” suggests the administration is not yet ready to present a formal proposal to either side, and that the Moscow and Kyiv meetings functioned more as fact-finding and relationship-building than as a negotiating session with concrete terms on the table. Whether the renewed attention translates into sustained momentum will likely depend on how much bandwidth the administration can devote to Ukraine while the Iran conflict remains unresolved. With tanker attacks, threats against Gulf energy infrastructure, and disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz still commanding significant attention in Washington, Ukraine’s place near the top of the president’s foreign policy agenda is not guaranteed to last. For now, the takeaway from the weekend is limited but notable: after months of the war receiving diminished high-level attention, two of Trump’s most trusted envoys have made direct contact with both Kyiv and Moscow in the same trip, restarting a diplomatic channel that had gone largely quiet.

Iran threatened Monday to hit back against any further U.S. attacks on its assets, warning that energy infrastructure across the Gulf, including American oil and gas interests, is within reach. “Strike our assets and you get struck,” Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf said, a day after U.S. and Iranian forces traded strikes on shipping over the weekend that pushed oil prices to near six-week highs. The warning highlights how close the conflict remains to further escalation. The two sides exchanged blows again over the weekend, with no sign of a diplomatic breakthrough that could end more than six months of fighting and restore normal energy flows through the Gulf. Iran has tightened restrictions on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical channel for global oil and gas supplies, since the war began with U.S. and Israeli strikes on February 28. On Sunday, senior Iranian security official Mohsen Rezaei said Tehran would soon announce a new restricted zone in the Gulf along with a new shipping corridor through the strait. Rezaei said the zone would begin where a U.S. naval blockade of Iran starts and extend into parts of the Gulf. Any vessel entering the area would be placed on an Iranian sanctions list. “We will only commit to the Strait of Hormuz being open when they [the Americans] stop the sabotage, threats and attacks on Iran,” Rezaei said. Qalibaf followed with his own warning, responding to comments from U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who had described Iran’s oil tanker fleet as “defenceless.” “It’s simple: the oil and gas production chain here is sprawling, accessible, and exposed. American oil and gas companies across these waters and facilities share that exposure,” Qalibaf, Iran’s top negotiator, wrote on X. Lebanon Bombardment Raises Escalation Fears Regional tensions rose further after Israeli strikes on a town in southern Lebanon killed at least 12 people Monday, according to Lebanon’s health ministry. Officials called it one of the deadliest days of bombardment in recent weeks. The strikes have stoked fears of a renewed Israeli military campaign despite a June ceasefire with the Iran-backed Hezbollah group. They also complicate efforts to resolve the wider conflict. Tehran insists that any lasting agreement with Washington must include an end to Israeli attacks in Lebanon. U.S. President Donald Trump has yet to achieve the goals he laid out when he launched “Operation Epic Fury” in February: ending Iran’s nuclear program, halting its ability to attack its neighbors, and creating conditions for Iranians to remove their leadership. Tehran’s clerical rulers remain in power and are aiming to emerge from the war stronger than before. They continue to demand sanctions relief and hope eventually to collect fees from ships using the strait, which carried a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments before the war began. After a relative lull through much of August, hostilities intensified again following the collapse of an interim ceasefire reached in June. Diplomatic efforts have made little headway since. Tanker Attacks Push Shipping To New Lows On Saturday, U.S. forces struck three Iranian oil tankers, including one near Kharg Island, Iran’s main oil export hub, according to U.S. Central Command. The strikes followed attacks by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards on U.S. warships operating in the region. Tehran has shown it can still hit U.S. interests in neighboring countries and disrupt oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz. Shipping data showed an average of just 10 commodity vessels transited the strait each day over the past 10 days, the lowest level since May. Sanctions And Oil Blockade Squeeze Iran’s Economy Iran has said it will step up efforts to tackle problems caused by U.S. sanctions crippling its economy. But the pressure is mounting. Three senior Iranian sources told Reuters that Washington’s campaign to choke off Iranian oil exports and curb sanctions evasion is becoming increasingly difficult for Tehran to withstand. Qalibaf acknowledged over the weekend that Iran’s struggle is no longer confined to the battlefield. Alongside the military confrontation, he said, the country faces major domestic challenges including inflation, unemployment, currency volatility and market instability. The conflict has also hit oil-producing Gulf Arab states such as the United Arab Emirates, which has come under fire from Iranian missiles and suffered attacks on its oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. UAE presidential adviser Anwar Gargash said Monday the country is building alternative routes for its energy exports and trade to avoid being “held hostage” by the war. The disruption has also reached the United States, where higher fuel prices have added to economic pressures and weighed on Trump’s popularity ahead of November’s midterm elections, which will decide control of Congress.

Israeli airstrikes killed at least 27 people across Lebanon in the 24 hours before Wednesday, officials said, with more than a dozen of the dead coming from a southern town where two earlier wars have already left deep scars. The Israeli military said its forces struck the southern town of Qana late Tuesday to target a Hezbollah commander. Fifteen people died in that strike. Photos and video from the scene showed flattened buildings and others missing their top floors. Rescue crews pulled bodies from the wreckage and brought in a bulldozer to clear rubble while they searched for anyone still trapped. Israel identified its target as Jalal Mustafa Hariri, a Hezbollah commander who oversaw the Qana area. Qana has been struck before, with devastating results. In 1996, Israeli artillery shelling hit a United Nations compound sheltering hundreds of displaced people in the town, killing more than 100 civilians and wounding scores more, including four U.N. peacekeepers. During the 2006 war, an Israeli strike on a residential building in Qana killed nearly three dozen people, a third of them children. Israel said at the time it had been aiming at a Hezbollah rocket launcher positioned behind the building. “Qana always gets its share,” Mayor Mohammed Krasht said, referring to the town’s history. A Mayor Killed In Nabatiyeh Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister, Najib Mikati, said Israel had “intentionally” struck a municipal council meeting in Nabatiyeh that had been called to coordinate relief efforts. Six people died in that strike. “What solution can be hoped for in light of this reality?” Mikati asked in a statement. More than half a dozen additional strikes hit Nabatiyeh and the surrounding area, Lebanon’s Health Ministry said, bringing the city’s death toll to 16 with 52 people wounded. Among the dead was the city’s mayor, Ahmad Kahil, according to provincial governor Huwaida Turk. U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert called reports of Kahil’s death “alarming.” “This attack follows other incidents in which civilians and civilian infrastructure have been targeted across Lebanon,” she said. Strikes also hit the eastern Bekaa Valley and other parts of southern Lebanon. The Israeli military said it was targeting Hezbollah command centers and weapons facilities it says are embedded in civilian areas. Lebanon’s crisis response unit counted 138 airstrikes and shellings on Wednesday alone. Hezbollah fired more than 90 projectiles into Israel that same day, the Israeli military said. Four civilians were wounded, according to Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service. Israel Says It Destroyed A Hezbollah Tunnel A video that spread widely online showed Israeli forces detonating large explosives on a hillside in Mhaibeb, a town roughly two miles from the Israeli border. The Israeli military said the target was a Hezbollah tunnel running beneath the village. Abdelmoe’m Shucair, mayor of the neighboring village of Mays el Jabal, told reporters that families there had already fled. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in Washington that the U.S. was aware of the footage. “We do not want to see entire villages destroyed,” he said, calling on Israel to pursue Hezbollah targets in ways that protect civilian infrastructure and civilians themselves. Beirut Strikes Resume After Six-Day Pause Israel struck Beirut’s southern suburbs again after holding off for six days, hitting what it described as an arms warehouse beneath an apartment building. It offered no evidence to support that claim. The military issued an evacuation warning before the strike, and no casualties were reported. The strikes came days after Mikati said the United States had assured him Israel would scale back attacks on the capital. Southern Beirut, known as the Dahiyeh, has a strong Hezbollah presence but is also a dense residential and commercial district home to large numbers of civilians with no ties to the group. The Israeli military posted its evacuation warning on X before the strike; the first of three airstrikes in the area came less than an hour later. Speaking to troops in southern Lebanon on Wednesday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said intelligence gathered from captured Hezbollah fighters was significantly weakening the group’s ability to launch attacks. “We will conduct negotiations under fire. I said that on the first day, I said it in Gaza, I said it here. This is our tool,” Gallant told soldiers. A Year Of Escalating War Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, a day after Hamas’s attack on southern Israel triggered the war in Gaza. What had been a year of lower-intensity fighting along the Israel-Lebanon border escalated into full-scale war last month, when Israel launched a ground invasion of Lebanon in early October. Israeli strikes have killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and most of his senior commanders since then. Israel has said it will keep up its offensive until residents of communities near the border can safely return home. Lebanon’s Health Ministry said 2,377 people have been killed in the country since last October, with more than three-quarters of those deaths coming in the past month alone. The fighting has displaced roughly 1.2 million people in Lebanon, including about 400,000 children. Hezbollah’s rocket fire, which has grown longer-range and more intense over the past month, has pushed around 60,000 Israelis out of their homes in the north. Attacks from Lebanon have killed close to 60 people in Israel, about half of them soldiers. Hezbollah has said its attacks will continue until a cease-fire is reached in Gaza. That prospect has grown more distant after months of U.S., Egyptian and Qatari-brokered negotiations stalled. Gaza Death Toll Climbs In Jabaliya Israel remains at war in Gaza more than a year after Hamas’s attack, which killed roughly 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and saw about 250 taken captive. Around 100 hostages are still being held, and roughly a third of them are believed to be dead. Israeli forces have spent more than a week carrying out a major operation in Jabaliya, a refugee camp in northern Gaza that dates to 1948. Israeli troops have returned to Jabaliya and nearby areas repeatedly, saying each time that Hamas fighters had regrouped there. Hospitals have received around 350 bodies since the Jabaliya offensive began on Oct. 6, said Dr. Mounir al-Boursh, director-general of Gaza’s Health Ministry. More than half of the dead were women and children, he said, and many bodies remain in the streets and under rubble because rescue teams cannot reach them due to ongoing strikes. “Entire families have disappeared,” al-Boursh said. Gaza’s Health Ministry says Israel’s offensive has killed more than 42,000 people. It does not distinguish fighters from civilians in that count but says women and children make up more than half. The offensive has left large parts of Gaza in ruins and displaced roughly 90% of the territory’s 2.3 million residents, pushing hundreds of thousands into overcrowded tent camps and shelters set up in schools.

U.S. special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner arrived in Moscow on Saturday to hold talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine, marking the latest attempt by Washington to broker a settlement in a conflict now approaching its fifth year. Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev met the pair on arrival. A motorcade carrying Witkoff, Kushner, and Dmitriev left the city’s governmental airport and headed into Moscow, according to a Reuters witness. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the TASS news agency that President Vladimir Putin would meet with Witkoff and Kushner at the Kremlin later that day. President Donald Trump said Friday that the U.S. now has a fresh, concrete proposal aimed at ending the war. He gave no details on what the proposal contains. Russia’s Point Man on the Talks Dmitriev has taken part in every previous meeting between the U.S. negotiators and Putin, working alongside Putin’s foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov. He told Reuters in June that he had stayed in contact with the American side even during a pause in their visits to Russia. Earlier this year, he also helped negotiate U.S. sanction waivers covering Russian oil exports. Envoys Set to Travel On to Kyiv Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Friday that Witkoff and Kushner plan to fly to Ukraine on Sunday after finishing their visit to Moscow. Writing on X on Saturday, Zelenskiy said Russia struck two Ukrainian airports ahead of the envoys’ arrival in Kyiv. Peskov said in a statement posted to the Kremlin’s channel on the Max messaging app that Putin had ordered Russian forces not to strike Kyiv for three days, starting at midnight Saturday, because of the envoys’ planned visit to the Ukrainian capital. A Quieter Day on the Battlefield Russia’s Defence Ministry reported 53 Ukrainian drones in Russian airspace on Saturday, a notably lower number than the average recorded in recent months. The lull coincided with Moscow’s City Day celebrations, which drew hundreds of thousands of people to open-air events across the capital. Despite the pause, the gap between Moscow and Kyiv on how to end the war remains wide. The conflict, now four and a half years old, is the deadliest in Europe since World War Two. Putin Said to Be Holding Out for More Territory A source close to the Kremlin, speaking to Reuters before news broke of the envoys’ trip, said Putin remains focused on capturing additional ground before agreeing to any settlement. The source said there is no chance of a front-line agreement until Putin completes his campaign to secure the remainder of the Donetsk region. According to the source, Putin believes, based on reports from his military commanders, that this goal will be achieved by the end of the year. Western military analysts consider that outcome unlikely given the slow pace of Russian advances. Ukraine has refused to hand over territory it has defended at heavy cost, and its officials describe Moscow’s proposed terms as equivalent to surrender. Kremlin Calls Its Position “Unshakeable” The Kremlin said Friday that the terms Putin laid out in a speech two years ago remain firm. Those terms call for Ukraine to cede the entirety of four regions claimed by Russia and abandon its bid to join NATO. Peskov described this position as unshakeable. Since the last round of peace talks in February, both sides have escalated long-range air strikes deep into each other’s territory, and fighting at sea has intensified as well. On the ground, front lines have remained largely fixed, with Russian forces making only gradual progress toward controlling the whole of Ukraine’s Donbas region. Economic Pressure Building on Both Sides Ukraine has stepped up drone strikes on Russian oil refineries throughout the summer, contributing to fuel shortages and rising prices for Russian motorists. Roughly 30 Ukrainian strikes have also hit large warehouses belonging mostly to Wildberries, Russia’s largest online retailer, disrupting the country’s consumer economy. Russia, meanwhile, has kept up pressure on Kyiv. A Russian drone attack struck the headquarters of Ukraine’s SBU security service in the capital on Friday, marking the tenth consecutive day of heavy strikes on the city. Zelenskiy said Ukraine would retaliate. What Comes Next The Moscow talks and the planned follow-up visit to Kyiv on Sunday will test whether Trump’s promised new proposal can narrow the divide between the two sides. With Putin reportedly unwilling to negotiate on the front line until Russian forces finish securing Donetsk, and Ukraine unwilling to cede defended territory, the coming days will show whether Witkoff and Kushner’s shuttle diplomacy can produce any movement beyond the three-day pause in strikes on Kyiv.

Two Nepali workers have been rescued alive from a hydropower tunnel more than a week after flash flooding tore through the Trishuli valley, killing at least 1,300 people and leaving thousands more unaccounted for. Rescue teams pulled Sanjay Sah and Kabir Maharjan from the Trishuli 3A Hydropower Project tunnel on Friday, nine days after they became trapped. Sah walked out on his own. Maharjan is now in hospital in critical condition. A third body was recovered from the same site around the same time. Authorities believe the person died after being swept up in floodwater while trying to flee the tunnel. What Caused the Disaster The flooding struck on Wednesday, 26 August, after a glacier collapsed near the Nepal-Tibet border. The collapse sent a wall of water and debris down the Trishuli valley, catching workers, villages, and infrastructure with little warning. More than 1,300 people have been confirmed dead. Officials say more than 5,300 remain missing across the affected region. At the Trishuli 3A tunnel alone, at least 39 workers are still believed to be trapped underground. Rescue officials say more than 100 additional workers are unaccounted for in similar tunnels scattered along the valley. How Sah Survived Nine Days Underground Sah told the BBC he chanted mantras to get through the ordeal. He said he managed to stay in contact with three of the other four workers trapped alongside him during the nine days underground. His account gives rescue teams a rare firsthand picture of conditions inside the tunnel system, where thick mud and displaced rock have slowed recovery efforts for over a week. Col Jhabindra Reshmi of the Nepali army said rescue crews are still working to clear a path into the tunnels. He said mud and rock buildup is making it harder for teams to reach areas where workers may still be alive. The “Goldilocks Zone” Theory An expert who spoke to the BBC said sections of the tunnel network may contain a “Goldilocks zone,” a pocket where conditions are neither too flooded nor too collapsed to sustain life. If such zones exist, they could explain how workers have survived more than a week without rescue. The theory has become a focal point for rescue planning in the Trishuli valley, where crews are trying to identify similar pockets in the roughly 100 other trapped workers’ locations. Rescue Effort Remains “Extremely Challenging” A power company executive told the BBC that conditions at the site remain difficult, citing the volume of mud, unstable rock, and the risk of further collapse as crews dig deeper into the tunnel system. Nepal’s energy minister struck a note of resolve when addressing the scale of the disaster. “As long as there is breath, there is hope,” the minister said. That sentiment now anchors the government’s approach to the search, even as the death toll climbs and the number of missing remains in the thousands. What Happens Next Rescue teams plan to continue working through the tunnel debris in the coming days, focusing first on areas identified as possible survival pockets. Search operations elsewhere in the flood zone continue alongside efforts to identify and recover victims already found. The rescue of Sah and Maharjan marks the first confirmed survivors pulled from the tunnels since the flooding hit nine days ago, and officials say it has renewed urgency around the search for the dozens still believed trapped.

Three senior Iranian sources say Washington’s campaign to choke off Iran’s oil exports and shut down sanctions evasion is becoming harder for Tehran to withstand, as the six-month war grinds toward a possible turning point. The US has ratcheted up economic pressure in recent weeks, aiming to extract concessions that months of military conflict have failed to secure. Iran’s clerical rulers spent decades finding ways around sanctions, but the latest measures have left them with few remaining channels to secure foreign currency or import goods, the sources said. Fighting Resumes as Pressure Builds The war erupted back into open combat this week. US forces struck targets along Iran’s Gulf coast, and Iran retaliated with strikes on US bases in Arab states. Neither side has signaled it will make the concessions the other is demanding, leaving the conflict in what may be a shifting stalemate. More oil is moving through the Strait of Hormuz despite Iranian attempts to keep disrupting the waterway. At the same time, the US blockade has cut off Iran’s main source of revenue entirely. Iran’s economy was already struggling before the war began, with a collapsing currency and rising inflation. Months of bombing have added a steep bill for rebuilding damaged industry and infrastructure. The financial strain is now eating into Tehran’s ability to pay the high premiums it needs to skirt sanctions illegally, according to the sources. Two Months of Gasoline Left The rial has hit record lows in recent days. One senior source said Iran has roughly two months of gasoline supply remaining. The fuel has to be imported despite the country’s domestic oil production, because Iran’s refining capacity cannot keep up with demand. Iran’s leadership understands the danger. An economic collapse could reignite the mass protests the government put down in January, when security forces killed thousands of demonstrators. “They are under very, very severe economic pressure. They’re losing control of the Straits. It’s really a question of if they choose to negotiate and I think they’ll have to,” said Ali Ansari, a professor of modern history at St Andrews University in Scotland. The conflict has entered a new stage, with each side now trying to shape the other’s domestic politics. A senior Iranian official said Tehran hopes the threat of runaway inflation will pressure the Trump administration ahead of November’s midterm elections, while Washington is betting the same pressure will push Iranians to revolt against their government. Sanctions Squeeze the Smuggling Routes Washington’s newest measures expand secondary sanctions on countries that do business with Iran, targeting the dollar transactions Tehran needs both to sell oil and to pay for imported goods and raw materials. That expansion is making Iran’s existing evasion networks, built on front companies, unregistered tankers and smuggling routes, too costly to keep running, the three senior sources said. Iranian crude loadings have dropped to about 260,000 barrels a day this month, down from roughly 1.7 million barrels a day a year earlier, according to data from commodity analytics firm Kpler. Only a trickle of oil still moves off Iranian terminals, carried out by truck, train or small boats across the Caspian Sea. Tehran maintains it still holds tens of millions of barrels in tankers stationed outside the blockade zone. But one official said the new sanctions are pushing intermediaries to step back from deals or demand higher payments to take the risk. Trade Falls, UAE Cuts Ties President Masoud Pezeshkian said total trade has fallen between 25% and 35%, with imports hit harder than exports. He is one of several senior officials who have warned in recent weeks that Iran’s economic situation is deteriorating fast. The United Arab Emirates, long one of Iran’s main trade conduits, announced on August 19 that it had halted all commercial exchange and financial dealings with Tehran until further notice. US pressure and Iran’s own military attacks have disrupted that route along with others. “If those channels stay closed, a supplier wants cash, a deal is routed through another country and a shipment arrives later and dearer,” said an Iranian trader in Tehran who deals in imported goods. Currency Crash and Rising Poverty The rial has lost more than half its value in a year, falling from about 1 million to the dollar to over 2.2 million now. Official figures put 12-month average inflation at 69.9%, with prices for food, beverages and tobacco rising at nearly double that rate. Official unemployment climbed to 9.1% this spring. The number of Iranians in work fell by about 450,000 compared with a year earlier, part of a broader drop in labor force participation. Even those still employed are struggling. The average monthly salary in Iran is around $125, far short of the roughly $450 a month that official data says a household needs to cover basic spending. “We are getting poorer every day,” said Mahnaz, a 34-year-old private-sector employee in Tehran, who asked that her family name not be used.