Attention to the Unseen

The Observer reports: Lyubov Antipova last spoke to her elderly parents almost two weeks ago, when she first heard rumours of a Ukrainian incursion, and begged them to leave their village in Russia’s Kursk region. The threat seemed unreal – Russian soil had not seen invading forces since the end of the second world war – and Russian state media initially dismissed the invasion as a one-off “attempt at infiltration”, so Antipova’s parents, who keep chickens and a pig on…

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Reuters reports: The powerful Iranian-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah published footage on Friday that appeared to show its fighters driving trucks with rocket launchers through a maze of tunnels to an apparent underground launch site. The footage, 4 minutes and 35 seconds long, is the latest in a series of videos by the group flaunting its purported military capabilities, as it trades fire with the Israeli military in parallel with the Gaza war. The newest video depicts fighters riding motorcycles,…

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Politico reports: The Biden administration is “open” to sending long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine, a move that would give Kyiv’s F-16s greater combat punch as it seeks to gain further momentum in its fight against Russia. The White House’s willingness to give Ukraine the Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile comes as Kyiv’s surprisingly successful ground assault deep inside Russia heads into its second week, embarrassing Vladimir Putin and forcing him to redirect troops from the battlefield in Ukraine. No final decision…

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  The United States, Qatar and Egypt are urging Israel and Hamas to hold a new round of negotiations to finalize a ceasefire deal in Gaza. However, Hamas is urging mediators to enforce the ceasefire terms proposed by President Biden in May that Hamas already agreed to and that Israel rejected. Daniel Levy, president of the U.S./Middle East Project and a former Israeli peace negotiator under Prime Ministers Ehud Barak and Yitzhak Rabin, says U.S.-led efforts for a ceasefire are…

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Michael Weiss and James Rushton write: “Russia’s borders do not end anywhere” ran Vladimir Putin’s electoral slogan in January 2024, in seeming justification of a war of conquest in Ukraine meant to be over shortly after it began. But in a surprise turn two and a half years after the full-scale invasion, Ukraine decided to make good on Putin’s loose definition of sovereignty by invading the Kursk region in southern Russia on Aug. 6, in what has become the largest…

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Anna Nemtsova writes: Last week, civilians in Russia experienced something new—something Chechens, Georgians, Syrians, Ukrainians, and other civilians in the path of Russia’s military have known about for decades. After Russian tanks withdraw and shelling stops, Moscow holds certain hot spots in stasis. They become “gray zones”: neither at war nor fully at peace, wrecked by heavy artillery, psychologically traumatized and economically ruined, under Russia’s boot but subject to its neglect. The gray zone has now come to the Russian…

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David Axe reports: On the sixth day of Ukraine’s advance into Kursk Oblast in southern Russia, there’s growing evidence the Ukrainian invasion corps—some or all of up to five 2,000-person brigades plus at least one 400-person independent battalion—plans to stay. The Ukrainians are digging trenches. Anticipating static warfare along or near the existing front line, the Russians are digging in, too. That both sides are fortifying their positions doesn’t mean the Ukrainians are done advancing. Nor does it mean the…

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The Intercept reports: [I]t’s … worth focusing on what Walz is not, said James Zogby, especially around the war on Gaza and pro-Palestinian protests in the U.S. Zogby, founder and president of the Arab American Institute, contrasted Walz with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who was widely reported to be the other frontrunner for Harris’s running mate, and believes that rejecting Shapiro in favor of Walz bodes well for Harris’s approach to the world. “What we have is somebody who will…

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AFP and Reuters report: Thousands of Ukrainian troops are taking part in an incursion aiming to destabilise Russia by showing up the country’s weaknesses, a top official from Ukraine has said as the assault entered its sixth day. “We are on the offensive. The aim is to stretch the positions of the enemy, to inflict maximum losses and to destabilise the situation in Russia as they are unable to protect their own border,” the security official said on condition of…

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  Tensions are once again escalating between Israel and Iran, after the Israeli military committed back-to-back assassinations last week on a commander of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah group in Lebanon and a prominent Hamas leader who was visiting Tehran for the new Iranian president’s inauguration. Israel is reportedly preparing for retaliatory strikes from both groups, and residents in southern Lebanon continue to flee as many fear that the ongoing crossfire between Hezbollah and Israel at the border could now turn into…

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