Almost 90 bombs were dropped in one region in just 24 hours.
Russia unleashed an unprecedented bombardment in southern Ukraine overnight in what local officials described as a “massive attack” in the conflict which has continued to rage even as the international community’s attention has moved to the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
The Ukrainian Internal Affairs Ministry on Monday morning said Russia dropped at least “87 aerial bombs on populated areas of the Kherson region - the largest number for all time.” At least eight people were also injured in other Russian strikes carried out in the Odessa region further to the west on Sunday night.
At this point, pouring on the bombs (shortly after gloating that the new speaker in congress suits Russia) seems likely to be as much about shifting morale (getting Ukraine to worry that its support from the west will dry up with Kremlin toadies in control of Washington’s purse strings) as it is about on-the-ground strategy or tactics.
It’s not like new Israeli atrocities detracts significantly from the world’s ability to pay attention to the atrocities in Ukraine, but anything that gives Moscow something else to gesture at gives it something to whatabout over, and getting the rest of the world (including nato members and US politicians) to fight amongst themselves (over whether it’s better to back a genocidal ethnostate or the terrorists resisting it) is always a win when the alternative might be for them to unify against your invasion of Ukraine.