Israeli military says it mistakenly killed 3 Israeli hostages in battle-torn part of Gaza

Israeli troops mistakenly shot three hostages to death Friday in a battle-torn neighborhood of Gaza City, and an Israeli strike killed a Palestinian journalist in the south of the besieged territory, underscoring the ferocity of Israel’s ongoing onslaught.

The deaths were announced as a U.S. envoy tried to persuade the Israelis to scale back their campaign sooner rather than later.

The hostages were killed in the Gaza City area of Shijaiyah, where troops have been engaged in fierce fighting with Hamas militants in recent days. The soldiers mistakenly identified the three Israelis as a threat and opened fire on them, said the army’s chief spokesman, Daniel Hagari.

He said it was believed that the three had either fled their captors or been abandoned.

“Perhaps in the last few days, or over the past day, we still don’t know all the details, they reached this area,” Hagari said. He said the army expressed “deep sorrow” and was investigating.

Hamas and other militants abducted more than 240 people in the Oct. 7 attack that triggered the war, and the hostages’ plight has dominated public discourse in Israel ever since. Their families have led a powerful public campaign calling on the government to do more to bring them home.

Demonstrations in solidarity with the hostages and their families take place nearly every day. Late Friday, hundreds of protesters blocked Tel Aviv’s main highway in a spontaneous demonstration calling for the the hostages’ return.

Israeli political and military leaders often say freeing all the hostages is their top aim in the war alongside destroying Hamas.

Still, in seven weeks since ground troops pushed into northern Gaza, they have not rescued any hostages, though they freed one early in the conflict and have found the bodies of several others. Hamas released over 100 in swaps for Palestinian prisoners last month, and more than 130 are believed to still be in captivity.

The three hostages were identified as young men who had been abducted from Israeli communities near the Gaza border — Yotam Haim, 28, Samer Al-Talalka 25, and Alon Shamriz, 26.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called their deaths an “unbearable tragedy” and vowed to continue “with a supreme effort to return all the hostages home safely.”

In southern Gaza, the Al Jazeera television network said an Israeli strike Friday in the city of Khan Younis killed cameraman Samer Abu Daqqa and wounded its chief correspondent in Gaza, Wael Dahdouh. The two were reporting at a school that had been hit by an earlier airstrike when a drone launched a second strike, the network said.

Khan Younis has been the main target of Israel’s ground offensive in the south.

Speaking from a hospital bed, Dahdouh told the network that he managed to walk to an ambulance. But Abu Daqqa lay bleeding in the school and died hours later. An ambulance tried to reach the school to evacuate him but had to turn back because roads were blocked by the rubble of destroyed houses, it said.

Dahdouh, a veteran of covering Israel-Gaza wars whose wife and children were killed by an Israeli strike earlier in the war, was wounded by shrapnel in his right arm.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Abu Daqqa is the 64th journalist to be killed since the conflict erupted: 57 Palestinians, four Israelis and three Lebanese journalists.

Palestinian U.N. Ambassador Riyad Mansour told a General Assembly meeting on the war that Israel “targets those who could document (their) crimes and inform the world, the journalists.”

“We mourn one of those journalists, Samer Abu Daqqa, wounded in an Israeli drone strike and left to bleed to death for six hours while ambulances were prevented from reaching him,” Mansour said.

The Israeli army did not immediately respond to an Associated Press request for comment about Abu Daqqa’s death.

Israel’s offensive has flattened much of northern Gaza and driven 80% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million from their homes. Displaced people have squeezed into shelters mainly in the south in a spiraling humanitarian crisis.

The offensive has killed more than 18,700 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry in Gaza. Thousands more are missing and feared dead beneath the rubble. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths. Its latest count did not specify how many were women and minors, but they have consistently made up around two-thirds of the dead in previous tallies.

While battered by the Israeli onslaught, Hamas has continued its attacks. On Friday it fired rockets from Gaza toward central Israel, setting off sirens in Jerusalem for the first time in weeks but causing no injuries. The group’s resilience called into question whether Israel can defeat it without wiping out the entire territory.

Israelis remain strongly supportive of the war and see it as necessary to prevent a repeat of the Hamas attack, in which militants killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians. A total of 116 soldiers have been killed in the ground offensive, which began Oct. 27.

U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration has expressed unease over Israel’s failure to reduce civilian casualties and its plans for the future of Gaza, but the White House continues to offer wholehearted support with weapons shipments and diplomatic backing.

Israeli airstrikes and tank shelling continued Friday, including in Khan Younis and in Rafah, which is one of the shrinking areas of tiny, densely populated Gaza to which Palestinian civilians have been told by Israel to evacuate. Details on many of the strikes could not be confirmed because communications services have been down across Gaza since late Thursday because of fighting.

In meetings with Israeli leaders on Thursday and Friday, U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan discussed a timetable for winding down the intense combat phase of the war.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told Sullivan that it would take months to destroy Hamas, but he did not say whether his estimate referred to the current phase of heavy airstrikes and ground battles.

“There is no contradiction between saying the fight is going to take months and also saying that different phases will take place at different times over those months, including the transition from the high-intensity operations to more targeted operations,” Sullivan said Friday.

Sullivan also met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to discuss Gaza’s postwar future. A senior U.S. official said one idea being floated is to bring back Palestinian security forces driven from their jobs in Gaza by Hamas in its 2007 takeover.

Any role for Palestinian security forces in Gaza is bound to elicit strong opposition from Israel, which seeks to maintain an open-ended security presence there. Netanyahu has said he will not allow a postwar foothold for the Abbas-led Palestinian Authority, which administers parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The U.S. has said it eventually wants to see the West Bank and Gaza under a “ revitalized Palestinian Authority “ as a precursor to a Palestinian state — an idea soundly rejected by Netanyahu, who leads a right-wing government that is opposed to Palestinian statehood.

Palestinian officials have said they will consider a postwar role in Gaza only in the context of concrete U.S.-backed steps toward statehood.

In the meeting, Abbas called for an immediate cease-fire and ramped-up aid to Gaza, and emphasized that Gaza is an integral part of the Palestinian state, according to a statement from his office. It made no mention of conversations about postwar scenarios.

The 88-year-old Abbas is deeply unpopular, with a poll published Wednesday indicating close to 90% of Palestinians want him to resign. Meanwhile, Palestinian support for Hamas has tripled in the West Bank, with a small uptick in Gaza, according to the poll. Still, a majority of Palestinians do not back Hamas, according to the survey.

AP

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Explosions resound in Kyiv, air defence units engage Russian drones

A series of explosions resounded throughout the Ukrainian capital early on Saturday as air defence units engaged Russian drones, Reuters witnesses said.

Explosions were reported on both banks of the Dnipro River that runs through the city.

There were no immediate reports of casualties or serious damage.

Mayor Vitali Klitschko said anti-aircraft units went into action as groups of drones flew near the city. He said Russian forces were targeting areas near the city centre.

Anti-aircraft activity was heavy, he said, in Darnytskyi district on the east bank of the Dnipro and explosions also struck historic Podil on the opposite bank.

The Reuters witnesses reported loud blasts just after midnight. A new series of explosions over the next 45 minutes hit areas near Kyiv's central districts.

The witnesses said air raid sirens went off on the eastern bank of the Dnipro River, but on the western bank police warned residents of the air raid through loudspeakers.

Authorities warned of possible missile attacks in areas of Kyiv region surrounding the capital, where explosions were also reported.

Air raid alerts remained in effect in a swathe of territory stretching through the country's central regions.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

More Ukrainians willing to trade land for peace – poll

The share of Ukrainians willing to make territorial concessions to Russia in exchange for a peace deal has almost doubled since early summer, according to a new survey. However, a significant majority still believe that Ukraine can beat Russia on the battlefield with more Western weapons.

The poll, carried out by the Kiev International Institute of Sociology and released on Thursday, found that 19% of respondents would favor such a deal, up from 10% in May; 74% insisted that “under no circumstances should Ukraine give up any of its territories,” while 7% were unsure.

Of those who would back a peace deal, 71% said that Ukraine would be able to win a military victory if it received enough weapons from the West. Among those who oppose a deal, belief in the supremacy of Western arms was even stronger, with 93% agreeing that “with proper support from the West, Ukraine can achieve success.”

The pollsters surveyed 1,031 adults in Ukraine and in parts of four formerly Ukrainian regions claimed by Kiev.

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has maintained since the start of the conflict that his military will retake all of Ukraine’s former territories, including Crimea. However, his long-promised summer counteroffensive failed to land Ukraine more than a handful of frontline villages and resulted in the loss of over 125,000 troops and 16,000 pieces of heavy equipment, according to the latest figures from the Russian Defense Ministry.

With the offensive halted, Zelensky is heading into 2024 with US Republicans blocking President Joe Biden’s promised $60 billion military aid package until at least mid-January. Existing US military aid is dwindling, and Zelensky has reportedly been instructed by the Pentagon to conserve what equipment remains.

Any future peace deal between Moscow and Kiev will be worse for Ukraine than the agreement proposed by the Kremlin before the conflict. In early 2022, Russia called on NATO to provide legally binding guarantees that Ukraine would not become a member of the bloc, and demanded that Ukraine abide by the 2015 Minsk agreements, which guaranteed autonomy to the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk.

Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye have all now seceded from Ukraine and joined the Russian Federation, and the Kremlin maintains that any potential settlement must take these new “territorial realities” into account. Russian President Valdimir Putin said on Thursday that Moscow seeks the “de-Nazification and demilitarization of Ukraine” as well as “neutral status” for the country, and will not stop its military operation until these goals are achieved.

Reuters/RT

Russian hydrologist Alexander Tsvetkov was detained in February 2023, after an AI system determined that his face was a 55% match to the sketch of a murderer drawn 20 years ago by a witness.

Alexander Tsvetkov, a scientist at the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of Inland Water Biology, has been living a nightmare for the past 10 months. He was removed from an airplane in February, following a work trip to Krasnoyarsk, and informed that he had been identified as the author of a series of murders over 20 years ago. Investigators claimed that he and his alleged accomplice killed at least two people in Moscow and the Moscow region in August 2002, ignoring the testimonies of multiple scientists that Tsvetkov had been with them at the time of the murders. The state’s smoking gun? An AI-powered system that found a 55% match between Tsvetkov and a sketch drawn by a witness over two decades ago.

The murders that Alexander Tsvetkov stands accused of occurred on August 2nd, 2002. First, a man with whom the suspects had allegedly drunk was killed after a quarrel. That same night, they robbed a 64-year-old woman, before finally attacking and killing another woman and her 90-year-old mother under the pretext of wanting to rent an apartment.

Tsvetkov’s alleged accomplice, who came forward and admitted to the murders, identified the scientist, but there were some issues with his testimony. He claimed that Alexander had been homeless with him in Moscow, drank alcohol, and “smoked half a pack of cigarettes a day”. Only Tsvetkov had never been homeless, didn’t drink, and hadn’t smoked a cigarette in his life because of lung problems. The accomplice also recalled that Tsvetkov had ring tattoos on his fingers and a Celtic pattern on his left hand. But the scientist’s relatives say that he never had any tattoos.

Many of Alexander’s scientist colleagues testified that he had been with them hundreds of kilometers away from the place where the murders had occurred, but authorities didn’t even consider them. The hydrologist was allegedly forced to write a confession that he later retracted, and he spent the last 10 months behind bars, while his family desperately tried to get him out.

According to several news sources, despite the mountain of evidence exonerating Tsvetkov in this murder case, Russian authorities chose to trust software powered by artificial intelligence. It had found that the hydrologist’s appearance matched that of the wanted killer about 55%, which was apparently enough to warrant his imprisonment.

Alexander Tsvetkov’s case has been making news headlines in Russia for months, and following a campaign asking for his release, as well as the rumored intervention of Vladimir Putin himself, the scientist was released earlier this month. However, the charges against him have not been dropped yet, so he is not out of the woods just yet.

Putin allegedly commented that “artificial intelligence is a complex topic, and if there are any failures in this area, they need to be analyzed and appropriate conclusions are drawn”.

Oddity Central

There are many environments where it would benefit you to check any people-pleasing tendencies at the door: work, romantic relationships, even friendships.

Holidays at your in-laws’ house is not one of them, says Sara Jane Ho, a Harvard-trained etiquette expert. Ho is the founder of the finishing school Institute Sarita, host of the Netflix show “Mind Your Manners,” and author of an upcoming book, also called “Mind Your Manners.”

If an in-law lobs a passive aggressive comment or a more direct insult your way, “just agree and play along,” she says. “Be very smiley.”

Let your partner take care of their parents

No matter how rude your spouse’s parents are, it’s not your job to reprimand them, Ho says. It’s your partner’s job.

“If you want to piss off your in-laws, let your spouse do it, not you,” she says.

In the moment you should only be agreeable. And you can let your spouse do the “dirty work” of explaining to their parents why certain comments are inappropriate, Ho says.

The same rule applies when your parents say something that makes your partner uncomfortable.

“You need to take care of your parents and they need to take care of their parents,” Ho says.

If you want to piss of your in-laws, let your spouse do it, not you.

Sara Jane Ho

etiquette expert

If it doesn’t make sense to smile and agree, Ho suggests just being silent.

“Oftentimes, I feel like when people are being rude the best thing is to just not say anything,” she told CNBC Make It earlier this year. “Let everyone wallow, and let them wallow in their misbehavior.” 

Don’t let the comments or questions sour your mood during the holiday.

“The greatest power is showing that the other person doesn’t have power over you,” Ho says.

CNBC

The World Bank says poverty rate in Nigeria has increased to 46 percent in 2023, representing 104 million poor Nigerians.

This was disclosed in World Bank’s Nigeria development update titled ‘Turning the corner: From reforms & renewed hope, to results,’ on Wednesday.

World Bank said Nigeria’s poverty rate rose from 40 percent in 2018 to 46 percent this year, as the number of poor people increased from 79 million to 104 million.

According to the report, more people have fallen below the poverty line due to sluggish growth and rising inflation.

“Sluggish growth and rising inflation have increased poverty from 40 percent in 2018 to 46 percent in 2023, pushing an additional 24 million people below the national poverty line,” World Bank said.

The report said the number of poor people in urban areas — more exposed to inflation — increased from 13 million to 20 million, while the number of poor people in rural areas rose to 84 million from from 67 million within the same period.

The reforms undertaken by President Bola Tinubu are ending petrol subsidy in May and devaluation of the naira by shifting to a unified, market-reflective foreign exchange (FX) rate in June.

World Bank said the reforms were essential for Nigeria to avoid a fiscal cliff and enable faster growth even though they brought difficult economic adjustments.

“Since May, retail gasoline prices have increased by an average of 163 percent and the Nigerian naira (N) has depreciated against the US dollar by 41 percent in the official market and by 30 percent in the parallel market,” World Bank said.

“The sharply higher price of gasoline and other imported goods has contributed to inflation, which increased from already elevated levels to 27.3 percent year-on-year (you) in October.”

On Wednesday, Alex Sienaert, the bank’s lead economist for Nigeria, said the country’s petrol should be priced at N750 per litre in filling stations based on present official exchange rate, not N650.

The Cable

When Sodiq Ajibade emerged from a Lagos pharmacy holding asthma medication, one drug on his prescription was missing because he did not have the money to buy it.

The price of some medicines has risen almost tenfold in Nigeria in the past few months, forcing patients like Ajibade to cut his dose or turn to traditional alternatives.

Pharmaceutical industry officials said the plunge in the value of the naira after the removal of currency controls in June has sent prices of new stocks rocketing.

British drug maker is moving from GSK-controlled local operating companies in Nigeria to a third-party direct distribution model. Some industry officials said this was also adding to woes, which GSK denied.

"I used to buy three medicines prescribed to me but now I have reduced to two, that is penicillin and aminophylline," said Ajibade.

Research firm Statista says only 3% of Nigerians have health insurance, meaning patients must find the money themselves to buy medication.

Nigeria's health ministry and National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control did not respond to requests for comment.

A GSK spokesperson said foreign currency shortages had affected GSK's ability to maintain consistent supply of medicines and vaccines in the market, leading to stockouts.

"The price increases we are seeing in Nigeria are not as a result of the decision to change the business model, and we regret that market forces outside our control have impacted the price of remaining stock in the market," the spokesperson said.

Cyril Usifoh, president of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria said most drugs were imported while local makers relied on imports for the pharmaceutical ingredients to produce medicines.

The naira has lost half its value since June, raising prices of everything from pain killers to drugs for chronic disease.

A Seretide asthma inhaler manufactured by GSK, for example, cost up to N8,000 ($9.42) in April but now retails for up to N70,000. Antibiotics like augmentin cost as much as N25,000, up from N4,500 in July.

"I am particularly worried about things like cancer drugs, anti-hypertensive drugs, diabetic drugs. The price has been astronomical," said Usifoh.

"If you have two, three drugs on your prescription you may find that you don't have enough money to buy all of them."

Faced with such high costs, 43-year-old Kano farmer Ubaidullah Nuhu Yusuf said he was resorting to traditional cures.

"By boiling guava and pawpaw leaves .. and inhaling the steam, this has proven effective to curing malaria and typhoid since affording an injection and buying the drugs is a problem," he said.

Reuters

Israeli defense minister says war on Hamas will last months as US envoy discusses timetable

Israel’s defense minister said it will take months to destroy Hamas, predicting a drawn-out war even as his country and its top ally, the United States, face increasing international isolation and alarm over the devastation from the campaign in Gaza.

Yoav Gallant’s comments came as U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan met with Israeli leaders to discuss a timetable for winding down major combat in Gaza. Israeli leaders repeated their determination to pursue the military assault until they crush the militant group for its Oct. 7 attack.

The exchange seemed to continue a dynamic the two allies have been locked in for weeks. President Joe Biden’s administration has shown unease over Israel’s failure to reduce civilian casualties and its plans for the future of Gaza, but the White House continues to offer wholehearted support for Israel with weapons shipments and diplomatic backing.

“I want them to be focused on how to save civilian lives,” Biden said Thursday when asked if he wants Israel to scale down its operations by the end of the month. “Not stop going after Hamas, but be more careful.”

Meanwhile, aside from small adjustments, Israel has changed little in what has been one of the 21st century’s most devastating military campaigns, with a mounting death toll.

The prime minister of the Palestinian Authority, Mohammed Shtayyeh, said it’s time for the United States to deal more firmly with Israel, particularly on Washington’s calls for postwar negotiations for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“Now that the United States has talked the talk, we want Washington to walk the walk,” Shtayyeh said in an interview with The Associated Press a day before Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is to meet with Sullivan in Ramallah.

The encounter is expected to focus, among other things, on Palestinian security forces and on revitalizing the Abbas-led Palestinian Authority, an autonomous government that administers pockets of the Israeli-occupied West Bank, said a senior Biden administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the White House.

The U.S. is exploring having security personnel associated with the Palestinian Authority help restore public safety in Gaza if Israel is successful in removing Hamas from control, the official said. Sullivan and other officials have discussed the prospect of having people associated with the Palestinian Authority security forces before Hamas took over the territory in 2007 serve as the “nucleus” of postwar peacekeeping in Gaza, the official said, adding that this was one idea of many being considered.

A deadly Hamas ambush on Israeli troops in Gaza City this week showed the group’s resilience and called into question whether Israel can defeat it without wiping out the entire territory. The campaign has flattened much of northern Gaza and driven 80% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million from their homes. Displaced people have squeezed into shelters mainly in the south in a spiraling humanitarian crisis.

Gallant said Hamas has been building military infrastructure in Gaza for more than a decade, “and it is not easy to destroy them. It will require a period of time.”

“It will last more than several months, but we will win, and we will destroy them,” he said.

After talks with Sullivan in Tel Aviv, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he told Israel’s “American friends” that the country was “more determined than ever to continue fighting until Hamas is eliminated — until complete victory.”

White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Sullivan talked with Netanyahu about moving to “lower intensity operations” sometime “in the near future.”

“But I don’t want to put a time stamp on it,” he said.

Earlier this week, Biden said Israel was losing international support because of its “indiscriminate bombing.” U.S. officials have been telling Israel for several weeks that the country’s window is closing for concluding major combat operations in Gaza without losing even more support internationally.

ARRESTS IN THE NORTH

The Palestinian telecommunications provider Paltel said Thursday that all communication services across Gaza were cut off due to ongoing fighting, severing the besieged territory from the outside world.

Heavy fighting has raged for days in areas around eastern Gaza City that were encircled earlier in the war. Tens of thousands of people remain in the north despite repeated evacuation orders, saying they don’t feel safe anywhere in Gaza or fear they may never be allowed to return to their homes if they leave.

The military released footage Thursday showing Israeli troops leading a line of dozens of men with their hands above their heads out of a damaged building it said was the Kamal Adwan Hospital in the north Gaza town of Beit Lahia. Men brought out four assault rifles and set them on the street along with several ammunition magazines.

In the video, a commander said militants had fired on troops from the hospital and that troops were evacuating those inside while detaining suspected militants. Earlier in the week, a Gaza Health Ministry official said weapons inside belong to the hospital’s guards. Neither side’s claims could be independently verified.

Israeli troops have held the hospital since Tuesday, according to the Health Ministry and U.N. During that time, 70 medical workers and patients were detained, including the hospital director, they said.

Several thousand displaced people sheltering there were evacuated after the raid, and the remaining patients — including 12 children in intensive care — will be taken to Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital, the Health Ministry said.

Israel says it is rounding up men in northern Gaza as it searches for Hamas fighters, and recent videos have shown dozens of detained men stripped to their underwear, bound and blindfolded in the streets. Some released detainees have said they were beaten and denied food and water.

A HEAVY CIVILIAN TOLL

Israel’s air and ground assault, launched in response to Hamas’ unprecedented attack into southern Israel on Oct. 7, has killed more than 18,700 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.

The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths. Its latest count did not specify how many were women and minors, but they have consistently made up around two-thirds of the dead in previous tallies. Thousands more are missing and feared dead beneath the rubble.

Multiple strikes hit Thursday in the southern cities of Khan Younis and Rafah, residents reported. After an early morning strike in Rafah, an Associated Press reporter saw 27 bodies brought into a local hospital Thursday.

One woman burst into tears after recognizing the body of her child.

“They were young people, children, displaced, all sitting at home,” Mervat Ashour said. “There were no resistance fighters, rockets or anything.”

New evacuation orders issued as troops pushed into Khan Younis earlier this month have pushed U.N.-run shelters to the breaking point and forced people to set up tent camps in even less hospitable areas. Heavy rain and cold in recent days have compounded their misery, swamping tents and forcing families to crowd around fires to keep warm.

Israel has sealed Gaza off to all but a trickle of humanitarian aid, and U.N. agencies have struggled to distribute it since the offensive expanded to the south because of fighting and road closures.

RISING SUPPORT FOR HAMAS

Israel might have hoped that the war and its hardships would turn Palestinians against Hamas, hastening its demise. But a poll conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found 44% of respondents in the occupied West Bank said they supported Hamas, up from 12% in September. In Gaza, the militants enjoyed 42% support, up from 38% three months ago.

That’s still a minority in both territories. But even many Palestinians who do not share Hamas’ commitment to destroying Israel and oppose its attacks on civilians see it as resisting Israel’s decades-old occupation of lands they want for a future state.

Israelis, meanwhile, remain strongly supportive of the war and see it as necessary to prevent a repeat of Oct. 7, when Palestinian militants attacked communities across southern Israel, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking some 240 hostage. A total of 116 soldiers have been killed in the ground offensive, which began Oct. 27.

Around half the hostages, mostly women and children, were released last month during a weeklong cease-fire in exchange for the release of 240 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

AP

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Kiev sends its soldiers to die – Putin

The Ukrainian leadership has grown desperate in the wake of its major summer counteroffensive failure, Russian President Vladimir Putin told a major press conference on Thursday. The Russian leader revealed some details about an ongoing operation, which has seen Kiev sending its troops on a “one way trip” to a tiny beachhead on the Russian-controlled bank of the Dnieper River in the Kherson region.

The Ukrainian media have been claiming over the past months that Kiev’s troops had managed to secure a beachhead on the left bank of the Dnieper River near the village of Krynki and have been “expanding” their presence in the area, while supposedly forcing the Russian troops to retreat.

The Russian president commented on the situation on Thursday by saying that Kiev’s actions essentially amounted to sending its troops to be “exterminated.” The Russian leader called it Ukraine’s "last attempt” to stage an attack after it “had failed to achieve anything anywhere” in its much-touted summer counteroffensive.

“I don't even know why they do that,” the president said, adding that the Ukrainian soldiers themselves call the operations in the area a “one way trip.” According to Putin, the Ukrainian Armed Forces deliver reinforcements and supplies to the beachhead from the opposite river bank with boats that are under the constant fire of the Russian artillery.

Russia’s losses in the area have been relatively small and mostly amounted to soldiers suffering non-lethal injuries, the president said, adding that Ukraine was losing its troops “by the dozens” at the same time. Moscow’s troops turned the Ukrainian beachhead into the “killing ground,” Putin said, calling the developments a “tragedy” for Ukraine. Yet, Kiev continues to just sacrifice its troops in the area for political reasons, he added.

A Ukrainian soldier fighting near Krynki described the situation in the area as “hell” and recalled how boats full of Ukrainian soldiers had been blown out of the water in attempts to reach the beachhead. He also spoke about the feeling of abandonment by Kiev’s military commanders.

“Those are not just regular Ukrainian soldiers, those are the elite assault teams that are relatively few,” the president said, adding that the losses near the Krynki village must be quite “sensitive” for Kiev.

Earlier, the Ukrainian media claimed that the Russian troops were “unable”to push the Ukrainian troops out of the area. According to Putin, Moscow just does not want to do that. “I would say it plainly: it is advantageous for us that they [the Ukrainian Armed Forces] are just mindlessly throwing their personnel in there,” he said, adding that he told the Russian General Staff chief, Valery Gerasimov, not to launch any counteroffensives in the area.

Kiev launched its major counteroffensive in early June. In late November, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky publicly acknowledged that the much-hyped operation had ended without success. The Ukrainian attacks had largely failed to bring about any major changes to the frontlines over almost six months of the offensive.

According to Russian Defense Ministry estimates, Ukraine has lost over 125,000 troops and 16,000 pieces of heavy equipment in failed attempts to move forward over the past half a year.

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Russian missiles strike central Ukraine targets, Ukraine air force says

Ukraine's Air Force said Russian MiG-31K fighter jets carrying Kinzhal hypersonic missiles struck targets in central Ukraine just 10 minutes after their takeoff from Savasleyka airbase sparked a national alert on Thursday.

The Air Force said it shot down one Kinzhal missile over Kyiv region, while another two hit Starokostiantyniv district, location of an air base in Khmelnytskyi region west of Kyiv that has been repeatedly attacked during the 21-month-old war.

Kyiv regional governor Ruslan Kravchenko said no casualties were reported, nor damage to critical and civilian infrastructure, after explosions were heard by a Reuters correspondent near the capital.

The Air Force said on the Telegram messaging app that Russian forces used three Kinzhals launched from three fighter jets in Russia's central Tula region, and that its anti-aircraft missile unit shot down one of the missiles in the Kyiv region.

"Of course, we do not comment on the consequences of hits/non-hits by enemy missiles in the Khmelnytskyi region," it added.

Local authorities said earlier that emergency services were working at the two crash sites, but no injuries or damage were recorded.

Overnight, Russia launched 42 drones and 6 missiles at Ukraine, with 11 people injured and buildings and warehouses damaged by falling debris. The Ukrainian military said it destroyed 41 drones.

The only thing that trumps the mocking viral videos of the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, are the live footages of the State House of Assembly being demolished on Wednesday morning by a dozen bulldozers in what appeared like a scene from Gaza.

Reporters were even warned to steer clear. It was no longer renovation as planned; it was a full-blown war zone.

Happening on Wike’s 56th birthday, it was the most unlikely birthday present from the government of Siminalayi Fubara that he installed six months ago in Rivers, Nigeria’s richest South-South state. If there was any hope that the attempt by President Bola Tinubu to reconcile the warring parties might succeed, the bulldozers crushed them.

The question is: what next?

A few days before the dozers were deployed to flatten the partially burnt House of Assembly with the furniture, fittings, files and whatever was inside, something else was trending.

Twenty-seven of the 32 members of the House of Assembly loyal to Wike had announced their defection from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC), trading the umbrella for the broom and excitedly waving the APC flag on the streets of Port Harcourt.

They had defected they said, not out of choice, but out of necessity to escape a divided party following the refusal of the party’s National Secretary to intervene in the crisis after the fire outbreak. Also, they claimed that in obedience to their constituents, they would keep their seats, a rampant habit among politicians of straining out the insect but swallowing the camel.

Of malaria and cancer

The defections stirred the social media, washing up old videos of Wike in his heyday as the tormentor of the APC.

In both the English and pidgin versions of the videos he spitefully dismissed the idea that he would leave his “malaria-infected PDP” for the “cancerous ruling APC”. Yet, after he fell out with the PDP over his shabby treatment, he supported APC’s Tinubu for the presidency, while rallying the state to vote PDP in the governorship election.

Suggestions that Wike might eventually join the APC are not new. In an article I wrote in September last year entitled, “Anatomy of Wike’s Endgame,” I said, “What is Wike’s Endgame? To avenge his displacement from within while securing the positions of his allies who are already carrying the PDP flag into the next election. His destination – if not by words, but by his conduct – is APC. Everything in-between is in translation.”

Politics rewards expediency, not constancy. That was why black congressman William Clay famously said in the game of politics, there are not permanent enemies, and no permanent friends, only permanent interests.

When, for example, a video of the former Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, rallying support for the Taliban and Al-Qaeda was exhumed three years ago, the minister blamed his indiscretion on youth. “I was young, then”, he said. “Now, I’m older and wiser.” Wike might also argue that he said what he said out of exuberance.

The more surprising thing in the drama out of Rivers State has been the speed with which Wike and Fubara fell out. Power tussle between governors and their benefactors or godfathers is not new. It is such a regular feature of transitions in our political landscape that current beneficiaries who start by despising godfathers soon become godfathers themselves. They invariably become what they hate.

Whether it is Governor Godwin Obaseki and his deputy Philip Shauib in Edo or the even more complicated version in Ondo between Rotimi Akeredolu and now acting Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa, it’s the same old story, only in more scandalous latter-day versions.

In Rivers, however, the speed, depth and extent of the fallout have been spectacular. It was not supposed to be this way. Wike was, in a sense, like the biblical David who couldn’t build a house for God because he fought too many bloody wars but left it for his son, Solomon.

Whether it was checkmating the tyranny of federal agencies, containing meddlesome Abuja politicians, showing up when federal agents descended on the state at night to arrest Supreme Court justices, or helping to rebuild the opposition as a vital force in what was fast becoming a one-party democracy, Wike never shied away from a fight.

Blame game

Although he lost the war to become the PDP’s presidential candidate in 2023, he won the battle to keep his state, leaving behind rich spoils of projects and a strategic alliance that paved a highway to Abuja, all supposed to secure a peaceful reign after him. In fact, as a seal, he ended the 16-year hegemony of the Ikwerre ethnic group in Rivers State by choosing an Ijaw man as his successor.

He seemed to have left his house in order, until October, when the first cracks appeared. Some have laid the blame on Wike, accusing him of leaving the chair, but taking its legs. He has been accused of running the state from Abuja and even asking the governor for the key to the treasury.

None of these accusations has come directly from Fubara himself. But it’s either the governor is enjoying the mudslinging or has become captive to forces in PDP, nPDP, APC and sundry Wike foes desperate to exploit the division and hijack him. There appears to be too many people around the governor egging him on to a war he does not need at an inauspicious time, and at a cost the state cannot afford.

What is the point, for example, of demolishing a multi-billion naira complex built by former Governor Peter Odili about 15 years ago under Rotimi Amaechi’s supervision as Speaker, when the government already has a High Court judgement forbidding the pro-Wike lawmakers to meet there?

Abuja as warfront

After the demolition of the House of Assembly, pro-Fubara lawmakers used a golden mace in storage in the Government House, as against the silver mace in the demolished complex, to receive the appropriation bill inside Government House, in defiance of an existing Supreme Court judgement in Hon. Muyiwa Inakoju & 17 Ors v Abraham Adeolu Adeleke & 3 Ors (SC 272/2006)[2007] NGSC (12 January 2007) that lawmakers cannot meet outside the House. Yet, if two wrongs don’t make a right, Fubara appears ready to try a third.

Wike has said Fubara’s attempt to tamper with his political structure, like a neonate dragging its mother’s womb and umbilical cord at the same time, was at the heart of the current conflict. He knows what he’s talking about, especially with local government elections coming up in February 2024.

If Wike was good enough to carry the governor through the dark, difficult days of their trials together when some of the governor’s ardent supporters today didn’t know him from Adam, the governor should be the last person to hang his benefactor out to dry so quickly.

The bigger challenge for Wike, however, is not Fubara or his army of snippers. It is not even about his legacy of projects in the state that would be hard to beat or his political structure which he can reinvent. It is how he would find the presence of mind to face his new assignment in Abuja, a city desperately in need of salvation.

Nearly overwhelmed with filth, pot-holed roads, street urchins, poor water supply and unlit highways, Abuja has become the warfront that Chinua Achebe was afraid of. It is the wayward place that Obafemi Awolowo would have gladly handed over to Walt Disney as a franchise.

This broken city needs attention 24/7. Wike will not be judged by his conquests in Rivers State; so Fubara may level the entire Port Harcourt if he chooses. The FCT minister will be judged by what he does in Abuja, a city in danger of decay in the face of a combined severe threat of livability malaria and malignant cancer.

** Ishiekwene is Editor-In-Chief of LEADERSHIP. More: azuishiekwene.com

Emma Beddington

It’s hard not to feel personally attacked by some research (does that make me a raging narcissist? Probably). With crisps and now sitting downrecently ruled empirically bad, it seems science is coming for everything I hold dear. Now, my one true love is being targeted: staring at my phone.

A new study, discussed in the excellent Techno Sapiens newsletter, explored how using your phone to avoid stranger awkwardness makes you feel “worse than if you didn’t”. For the research, 395 strangers were split into groups and asked to wait together for a (pretend) test. Half had phones, half not, and participants assessed how they felt at five-minute intervals. The researchers’ theory was that non-phone people would enjoy their time more, but that the digital comfort blanket would feel better in the short term. That was wrong. “Phones failed to confer any detectable benefits.” Even in the first five minutes, non-phone users were happier. “People may be acting against their own best interest when they use phones in social situations,” the study concluded.

I do this constantly: waiting in shop queues, for buses or for choir to start. Rather than experience momentary awkwardness, I assume my best “I must deal with this” face and poke my phone with an air of importance. There’s a particular kind of shame in these moments because absolutely nothing I do is important. Nothing bad will happen if I delay answering the handful of work emails I get each day; I’m not running a power plant or a stroke ward. I’m mainly reading messages from the tireless Dutch Royal Mint flogging commemorative coins and companies trying to sell me perimenopause-appropriate athleisure; maybe a vegan protein powder company speculating what the royal family eats at Christmas. If you see me typing urgently, I’m commenting on a video of my best friend’s cat.

But technology gave us the option of staring at something instead of interacting – and we’ve seized it gratefully. A 2015 survey from the Pew Research Centre found that 73% of Americans have used their phones “for no particular reason, just for something to do”, while a 2018 survey found that 45% of teens have pretended to text (I reckon 100% of adults).

I’m not anti-phone; I worship my black rectangle of delight. I also think there’s a distinction between situations with reasonable scope for interaction, and those without: standing on a train station platform not looking at your phone feels genuinely suspect; when I’m out of battery, I worry I’ll be rounded up by the British Transport Police in a See it. Say it. Sorted operation. But if you could be talking to someone who might be receptive, surely it’s ruder not to try? A sad if unsurprising finding from a 2021 study from the University of Pisa was that phone use appears to be contagious: when one person started, others followed. By caving in to our desire to avoid awkwardness, we might be undermining not just our own wellbeing, but other people’s.

So I left my phone in my coat at pilates last week. The first minutes, when other people in the room were already in conversation, felt arduous. What if a distant acquaintance had posted a picture of a bird? Maybe someone on NextDoor needed me to weigh in on an inconsiderately parked car? What if – and that’s the crux of it, of course – no one wanted to talk to me? It was fine. A woman said she had trained her cat not to scratch things and I couldn’t resist asking her how (she shouted at it until it stopped). By the time we had cleared that up, the class was starting. The next day, engaging my seatmate on a packed bus in conversation (complaining about the packed bus, obviously), barely felt transgressive at all. Did I feel good? I felt less pathetic, that’s for sure.

So I’m keeping it up, and if I get shunned, it’s OK. I’ve decided that the true power move is not looking importantly at your phone anyway; it’s looking beatifically happy with your own thoughts, as if the internet can’t possibly compete with the richness therein. I’ll only be thinking about Dutch commemorative gold ducats or a stranger’s pet, but no one need ever know.

** Emma Beddington is a Guardian columnist

The Guardian, UK