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      Russian Strike’s Toll Rises to 10 as Zelensky Blames Air Defense Delay

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      President Volodymyr Zelensky did not refer to the United States but his words appeared to reflect frustration at a stalled American aid package.Rescue workers in the southern Ukrainian city of Odesa pulled the bodies of a mother and baby from the rubble of an apartment building on Sunday, bringing the death toll in a Russian attack two days ago to 10. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said delays by the country’s allies in supplying air defenses had contributed to the deaths.The denunciation by Mr. Zelensky appeared to reflect frustration that Ukraine’s capacity to resist Moscow’s military campaign and protect its own citizens has been undermined by the failure of the U.S. House of Representatives to pass a multibillion-dollar military aid package.The drone hit the building overnight on Friday and since then emergency workers have been picking through rubble. Odessa, a port city on the Black Sea, was a key initial target of Moscow’s full-scale invasion two years ago and in recent months Russian forces have frequently targeted the city with drone strikes, often launched from Crimea. This weekend’s attack, however, has caused particular outrage among Ukrainians.Rescue workers said that the mother and baby were found together. “The mother tried to cover her 8-month-old child,” said a statement by the State Emergency Service posted on the Telegram social messaging service. “They were found in a tight embrace.”A 3-year-old girl was among eight people who had been injured, Mr. Zelensky said in an overnight speech, in which he said that Ukrainian civilians were more vulnerable because the country’s armed forces lacked air defenses that could shoot down the Shahed drones that Iran has supplied to Moscow.“The world has enough missile defense systems, systems to protect against Shahed drones and missiles. And delaying the supply of weapons to Ukraine, missile defense systems to protect our people, leads, unfortunately, to such losses,” he said. He did not refer specifically to U.S. aid, but the country is by far Ukraine’s biggest overall military donor.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Pakistan’s New Leader, Shehbaz Sharif, Installed

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      Parliament’s election of Shehbaz Sharif for a second term follows a month of political turmoil. The new government faces economic troubles and questions of legitimacy.Pakistan’s newly elected Parliament approved Shehbaz Sharif as prime minister on Sunday, ushering in his second term in that role and capping weeks of upheaval — as well as setting into motion a government facing economic and political challenges that are likely to leave the country in turmoil for years to come.His selection also brings to a crossroads the role of Pakistan’s powerful military, which has long been seen as an invisible hand guiding the country’s politics and has previously engineered its election results. Analysts say that public confidence in Mr. Sharif’s government is low.“The government is being seen as foredoomed,” said Talat Hussain, a political analyst based in Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital.Mr. Sharif secured 201 votes in the national assembly, while his closest rival, Omar Ayub, a supporter of the imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan, got 92.Before the voting began, Mr. Sharif arrived in the main hall accompanied by his older brother, Nawaz, who was also elected as a member of the national assembly. The two brothers sat together in the front row, a reminder that the elder Sharif, himself a three-time prime minister, remains influential and is likely to wield power behind the scenes.The proceedings started with a loud protest in support of Mr. Khan. Several Khan supporters sat in front of the speaker’s dais to chant slogans; many others waved pictures of Mr. Khan, as they, too, shouted slogans in support of the cricket star turned politician.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Gaza Aid Convoy Deaths: What We Know From Israeli Military Footage

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      Gazan authorities said that more than 100 people were killed and hundreds more injured in a chaotic scene early Thursday morning in Gaza City, where a crowd gathered around a convoy of trucks carrying desperately needed aid and the Israeli military opened fire. Drone footage released by the Israeli military shows hundreds of people circling […] More

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      Ukraine’s Deepening Fog of War

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      The forecasts are anything but optimistic: The best Ukraine can hope for in 2024, many Western officials and analysts say, is to simply hold the line.Only a year ago, Ukraine was brimming with confidence. It had defied expectations, staving off Russia’s attempt to take over the country. Western nations, buoyed by Ukraine’s success, promised aid to help Ukrainians break through Russian lines.But the flow of much-needed weapons from allies into the country was unpredictable, and slow. Ukraine’s own domestic arms production was mired in bureaucracy, top military officials have said. And the command structure of the army was not changing quickly enough to manage a force that had expanded from 200,000 troops to nearly a million in a matter of months.Those weaknesses, and some strategic battlefield missteps, stymied Ukraine’s widely telegraphed counteroffensive, which resulted in only marginal territorial gains. At the same time, Russia was fortifying its defensive lines, converting its economy to war production, conscripting hundreds of thousands of fighters and adjusting its strategy for renewed offensives this winter.Now, as the war enters its third year, leaders in Kyiv are trying to find a new path forward amid ferocious Russian assaults, while facing a series of daunting unknowns.Missiles hit apartments outside Kharkiv this month, killing five civilians.Lynsey Addario for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. Imposes Major New Sanctions on Russia, Targeting Finance and Defense

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      The Biden administration, responding to the death of Aleksei A. Navalny, unveiled its largest sanctions package to date as the war in Ukraine enters its third year.The United States on Friday unleashed its most extensive package of sanctions on Russia since the invasion of Ukraine two years ago, targeting Russia’s financial sector and military-industrial complex in a broad effort to degrade the Kremlin’s war machine.The sweeping sanctions come as the war enters its third year, and exactly one week after the death of the opposition leader Aleksei A. Navalny, for which the Biden administration blames President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. With Congress struggling to reach an agreement on providing more aid to Ukraine, the United States has become increasingly reliant on financial tools to slow Russia’s ability to restock its military supplies and to put pressure on its economy.Announcing the sanctions on Friday, President Biden reiterated his calls on Congress to provide more funding to Ukraine before it is too late.“The failure to support Ukraine at this critical moment will not be forgotten,” he said in a statement.The president added that the sanctions would further restrict Russia’s energy revenues and crack down on its sanctions evasion efforts across multiple continents.“If Putin does not pay the price for his death and destruction, he will keep going,” Mr. Biden said. “And the costs to the United States — along with our NATO allies and partners in Europe and around the world — will rise.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. Defends Israel’s Occupation of the West Bank at Top U.N. Court

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      A U.S. official urged judges not to call for Israel’s withdrawal from occupied territory, arguing that Israel faced “very real security needs” and that a Palestinian state must be established for a lasting peace.The United States on Wednesday defended Israel’s decades-long occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, arguing at the U.N.’s highest court that Israel faced “very real security needs.”The defense came a day after the United States issued its third veto against a call for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza at the United Nations Security Council, a vote that drew an angry response from nations and aid groups that have urged a stop to the fighting to help Gaza’s civilians.The latest show of American support for Israel was at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, where Richard C. Visek, the acting legal adviser at the U.S. State Department, urged a 15-judge panel not to call for Israel’s immediate withdrawal from occupied Palestinian territory.The United States urged the International Court of Justice not to call for immediate withdrawal of Israel from Palestinian territories, and to consider the country’s security needs.Piroschka Van De Wouw/ReutersHe said that only the establishment of an independent Palestinian state “living safely and securely alongside” Israel could bring about lasting peace, repeating a longstanding U.S. position, but the prospect of which appears even more elusive amid the war in Gaza.“This conflict cannot be resolved through violence or unilateral actions,” Mr. Visek said. “Negotiations are the path to a lasting peace.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. Warns Allies Russia Could Put a Nuclear Weapon Into Orbit This Year

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      The American assessments are divided, however, and President Vladimir Putin denied having such an intention, saying that Russia was “categorically against” it.American intelligence agencies have told their closest European allies that if Russia is going to launch a nuclear weapon into orbit, it will probably do so this year — but that it might instead launch a harmless “dummy” warhead into orbit to leave the West guessing about its capabilities.The assessment came as American intelligence officials conducted a series of rushed, classified briefings for their NATO and Asian allies, as details of the American assessment of Russia’s intentions began to leak out.The American intelligence agencies are sharply divided in their opinion about what President Vladimir V. Putin is planning, and on Tuesday Mr. Putin rejected the accusation that he intended to place a nuclear weapon in orbit and his defense minister said the intelligence warning was manufactured in an effort to get Congress to authorize more aid for Ukraine.During a meeting with the defense minister, Sergei K. Shoigu, Mr. Putin said Russia had always been “categorically against” placing nuclear weapons in space, and had respected the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which prohibits weaponizing space, including the placement of nuclear weapons in orbit.“We not only call for the observance of the existing agreements that we have in this area,” he was quoted as saying by the Russian state media, “but we have proposed many times to strengthen these joint efforts.”On Wednesday, Mr. Putin reinforced the central role he believes Russia’s nuclear arsenal plays in the country’s defenses: Visiting an aviation factory, he climbed into the bomb bay of a Tu-160M strategic bomber, the most modern in the Russian fleet.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Netanyahu Says He Won’t Bow to Pressure to Call Off Rafah Invasion

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      The Israeli leader has come under international pressure to drop a threatened incursion into the city where more than a million Palestinians are gathered, seeking refuge from the war.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel insisted on Saturday that Israel would not bow to international pressure to call off its plan for a ground invasion of Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza that is now packed with more than a million Palestinians.Many of the people now in Rafah are displaced and living in schools, tents or the homes of friends and relatives, part of a desperate search for any safe refuge from Israel’s military campaign, which has dragged on for more than four months. Their lives are a daily struggle to find enough food and water to survive.“Those who want to prevent us from operating in Rafah are basically telling us: Lose the war,” Mr. Netanyahu said at a news conference in Jerusalem on Saturday evening. “It’s true that there’s a lot of opposition abroad, but this is exactly the moment that we need to say that we won’t be doing a half or a third of the job.”About the same time as Mr. Netanyahu addressed the news conference, thousands of anti-government protesters filled a central thoroughfare in Tel Aviv — the largest protest against the prime minister in months. They filled the same street where mass protests against Mr. Netanyahu’s efforts to weaken the country’s judiciary riled the nation before the start of the Israel-Hamas war.Calls for an immediate election rose above a din of air horns. Protesters lit a red flare in the middle of a drum circle while others wielding flags stared down half a dozen police officers on horseback.“The people need to rise up, and the government needs to go,” said one protester, Yuval Lerner, 57. Mr. Lerner said that even before the war, he lost confidence that the government has the nation’s best interest at heart, but “Oct. 7 proved it,” he said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More