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      Jordan Says It Shot Down Iranian Drones As Act of Self-Defense

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      The response by Israel and other nations to Iran’s aerial attack kept the majority of its drones and missiles from landing in Israel, ensuring they caused only light damage and a handful of injuries, Israeli officials said.An unexpected — and for some, unwelcome — actor played a role in Israel’s defense: Jordan, the Arab kingdom next door.Jordan fought four wars with Israel between 1948 and 1973 before signing a peace treaty in 1994. Its population is heavily made up of Palestinians, and their descendants, who were barred from returning to their homes by Israel after the 1948 war that followed the establishment of the Jewish state.Jordan’s involvement was welcomed by older Israelis who remembered when Jordan would shell Israel. But Palestinians and their supporters denounced Jordan’s role, accusing the kingdom of siding with Israel at a time when its military offensive in Gaza has killed more than 33,000 Palestinians, according to health officials there.Amir Tibon, a journalist for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, celebrated the role played by Israel’s allies, including Jordan. He called it “an important lesson for us Israelis.”“Science, technology and alliances with the world: These are the things that hold Israel together,” he wrote.On Sunday, Jordan’s government issued a statement describing its military action as an act of self-defense, not done for the benefit of Israel.It said the drones and missiles “that entered our airspace last night were dealt with and confronted preventively without endangering the safety of our citizens and residential and populated areas.”It military will continue to defend Jordan against any future incursions by “any party” in defense of “the nation, its citizens, and its airspace and territory,” the Jordanian government added.That official explanation did not mollify critics of Jordan’s involvement on Sunday. Large pro-Palestinian demonstrations have taken place in Jordan since the war began in October, and the authorities have often responded harshly. This year, Amnesty International criticized the kingdom for arresting more than 1,000 protesters and others.Social media users shared a meme of Jordan’s ruler, King Abdullah II, wearing an Israeli military uniform. In a post on X, Dima Khatib, the managing director of AJ+, a digital news organization owned by the pan-Arab network Al Jazeera, called Jordan’s actions “shocking.”“Friendly countries are responding, not to the attack of Israeli planes, drones and missiles on Palestine, but to an attack on Israel,” she wrote. “There are Arab citizens who pull the trigger to protect Israel and watch when the Palestinians are bombed.” More

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      Israel’s Account of World Central Kitchen Strike Raises Wider Legal Questions, Experts Say

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      The events that led to the deaths of seven World Central Kitchen workers suggest that there could be problems with the protocols used by the Israeli military, according to legal experts and aid organizations.Israel’s account of its attack on a World Central Kitchen convoy raises significant legal questions even if the strike was the result of a series of mistakes, experts say.The Israeli military announced on Friday that its preliminary investigation had revealed a string of errors that led to the deaths of seven aid workers. It took responsibility for the failure, saying that there were “no excuses” and citing “a mistaken identification, errors in decision-making and an attack contrary to the standard operating procedures.”But the description of events that has emerged raises broader questions about the military’s ability to identify civilians and its procedures for protecting them, legal experts told The New York Times — including new concerns about whether Israel has been complying with international law in its conduct of the war in Gaza more generally.The law: When in doubt, presume civilian status, and give humanitarian aid heightened protectionThe first, most basic principle of international humanitarian law is that civilians cannot be targets of a military attack. Militaries must have procedures in place to distinguish between civilians and legitimate military targets.“In the case of doubt as to a convoy or person’s status, one is to presume civilian status,” said Tom Dannenbaum, a professor at the Fletcher School at Tufts University who is an expert on humanitarian law. “And so, attacking in the context of doubt is itself a violation of international humanitarian law.”Humanitarian aid workers and aid facilities are entitled to heightened protections, because they deliver relief to endangered civilians, said Janina Dill, a co-director of the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict.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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      Russian Missiles Hit Kharkiv, Killing at Least 6

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      The latest assault on the eastern city killed at least six people, local authorities said. As Kyiv waits on American aid, Moscow has stepped up bombardments, including using modified “glide bombs.”Russian rockets slammed into residential buildings in Kharkiv before dawn on Saturday, Ukrainian officials said, killing at least six people and injuring at least 11 more in the latest assault on Ukraine’s second-largest city.“Russian terror against Kharkiv continues,” President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said in a statement. “It’s crucial to strengthen the air defense for the Kharkiv region. And our partners can help us with this.”Ukraine’s air defenses have come increasingly under strain since American military support stopped flowing into the country more than six months ago, and future assistance remains uncertain amid Republican resistance in Congress to a $60 billion aid package.Speaker Mike Johnson, Republican of Louisiana, has hinted that he would soon bring the issue of military aid for Ukraine to a vote in the House, but has also said that he might tie the issue to unrelated matters like domestic energy policies that could complicate its passage.At the same time, Russia has replenished and expanded its stockpile of missiles, guided bombs and attack drones and is stepping up its bombardments across the country.Mr. Zelensky said this past week that “in March alone, Russian terrorists used over 400 missiles of various types, 600 Shahed drones and over 3,000 guided aerial bombs against Ukraine.”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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      Ukraine Stages Flurry of Attacks and Drone Strikes on Russia

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      The attacks and drone strikes across the southern border were intended to counter President Vladimir V. Putin’s control over Russia, a leader in one of the groups said.Ukraine staged a flurry of cross-border ground attacks and long-range drone strikes into Russia on Tuesday, assaults that appeared aimed at disrupting President Vladimir V. Putin’s re-election campaign messaging that the war had turned in Moscow’s favor.Three armed groups of Russian exiles who operate in coordination with Ukraine’s military said they had crossed the border into southern Russia overnight and were fighting in border regions. Farther from the border, drone strikes hit a Russian oil refinery and fuel depot.Throughout the war, Ukraine has struck targets inside Russia to disrupt military logistics, hit airplanes parked on runways and blow up railway bridges. The cross-border attacks, Ukrainian officials have said, are also intended to unnerve Russians and undermine Mr. Putin’s efforts to insulate them from the war.Mr. Putin has through his two and a half decades in power — and through multiple elections, the next of which is scheduled to be held next week — portrayed an image of bringing order to Russia. The Kremlin has also barred the only vocally antiwar candidate from running.The reported border-area fighting in two regions, Kursk and Belgorod in southern Russia, could not immediately be independently confirmed.The groups saying they crossed into Russia — the Free Russian Legion, the Russian Volunteer Corps and the Siberian Battalion — operate in coordination with Ukraine’s military. Some members of the groups, including the leader of the Russian Volunteer Corps, hold far-right nationalist views.Members of two of the organizations, the Volunteer Corps and the Legion, also crossed into Russia last spring to skirmish with Russia’s border patrol and military. But whereas the incursion last spring was considered to have a military purpose — diverting Russian forces to the border before a planned Ukrainian offensive elsewhere — the attacks on Tuesday delivered a more overtly political message.A deputy commander of the Free Russia Legion, Maksimillian Andronnikov, posted a video on social media describing the incursion as being timed to the lead-up to a presidential election that is set to extend Mr. Putin’s tenure into a fifth term.“We are the same Russians as you,” Mr. Andronnikov said in the address. “We also have the right to a statement of will.”The reports of the fighting in the border region coincided with Ukrainian drone attacks throughout central Russia, including a strike on an oil refinery near Nizhny Novgorod, east of Moscow. The refinery operator, Lukoil, said the facility had halted operations but did not clarify why.A spokesman for Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, Andriy Yusov, confirmed that Ukraine had launched the wave of long-range strikes but he did not clarify their intention or confirm specific targets.“Such incidents will occur with everything used for military purposes, one way or another,” Mr. Yusov told Radio Liberty. “This work will continue.”Oleksandr Chubko More

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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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      N.Y.P.D. Drones Carrying Rafts Could Join Lifeguards in Beach Rescues

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      Mayor Eric Adams, an avowed technophile, said the drones would be used to assist lifeguards at Coney Island as part of a pilot program starting this summer.This summer, struggling swimmers off Coney Island might be met not just by a young lifeguard in an orange suit but also by assistance from above, in the form of a buglike device delivering an inflatable float.The raft-bearing drone is the latest in a series of gadgets promoted by Mayor Eric Adams as a way to improve life in New York City. Discussing the drone during his weekly question-and-answer session at City Hall on Tuesday, the mayor said it would begin flying as part of a pilot project to address a chronic summer problem.“They’re going to start out with Coney Island, and they’re going to grow from there,” Mr. Adams said, referring to the entertainment mecca on Brooklyn’s south shore. “I think it can be a great addition to saving the lives of those that we lose over the summer.”New York City may be known for its concrete-and-steel canyons, but it boasts 14 miles of city beaches, from Coney Island in Brooklyn and Rockaway Beach in Queens to Orchard Beach in the Bronx and South Beach in Staten Island.City officials have long struggled to improve water safety at public beaches, with their strong riptides, legions of unskilled swimmers and perennial lifeguard staffing shortages. Four people drowned last year off city beaches, all of them when lifeguards were off duty, and three drowned the year before that, city officials said. But there have been years with more drownings: In 2019, there were at least seven at Rockaway beaches alone.Mr. Adams, a self-described “tech geek,” has already assigned a robot to patrol the Times Square subway station and promoted a lasso-like device to restrain emotionally disturbed people.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. Says it Struck Houthi Targets, Including Underwater Drone, in Yemen

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      The United States struck five Houthi military targets, including an undersea drone, in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen on Saturday, the U.S. military announced on Sunday.The use of the underwater drone is believed to have been the first time that Iran-backed Houthis had employed such a weapon since they began their campaign against ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden on Oct. 23, the military’s Central Command said in a statement.American military officials provided few details of what they called an “unmanned underwater vessel,” but the Houthis have received much of their drone and missile technology from Iran. In addition to the underwater drone, the Houthis were also using a remotely piloted boat, the statement said.The U.S. struck both the surface drone and the submarine drone and launched other strikes against anti-ship missiles, the military said in its statement, but provided no precise details on the location.Maritime drones are becoming an increasingly powerful and effective weapon. Ukraine has used sea drones to devastating effect against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. Ukraine has deployed both drones that skim the surface of the water and those that travel underwater to attack Russian ships.Mick Mulroy, a former Pentagon official and C.I.A. officer, said the Houthis’ use of an underwater drone was significant. He said the Houthis appeared to be adjusting their strategy.“Unmanned surface and subsurface vessels are likely more difficult to detect and destroy than aerial drones and anti-ship missiles,” Mr. Mulroy said. “If all of these weapons systems were used against one target, it could overwhelm the ship’s defenses.”The United States Central Command, which is overseeing operations against the Houthis, said the strikes were conducted on Saturday after determining the missiles and the drones posed a threat to both American Navy ships and commercial vessels.In late October, the Houthis began a campaign to target commercial vessels, mostly in the Red Sea, off the coast of Yemen, saying that the attacks were in solidarity with Palestinians under attack in Gaza by Israel. The stepped-up attacks have prompted an American-led international maritime response, including a series of strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen.The U.S. has accused Iran of supplying the Houthis and in some cases helping plan operations. However, more recently, American officials have said that Iran does not have direct control over the Houthis. More

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      U.S. and U.K. Launch Heavy Strikes on Houthi Sites in Yemen

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      The United States and Britain carried out large-scale military strikes on Saturday against multiple sites in Yemen controlled by Houthi militants, according to a statement from the two countries and six allies, as the Biden administration continued its reprisal campaign in the Middle East targeting Iran-backed militias.The attacks against 36 Houthi targets at 13 sites in northern Yemen came barely 24 hours after the United States carried out a series of military strikes against Iranian forces and the militias they support at seven sites in Syria and Iraq.American and British warplanes, as well as Navy Tomahawk cruise missiles, hit deeply buried weapons storage facilities; missile systems and launchers; air defense systems; and radars in Yemen, the statement said. Australia, Bahrain, Denmark, Canada, the Netherlands and New Zealand provided support, which officials said included intelligence and logistics assistance.“These precision strikes are intended to disrupt and degrade the capabilities that the Houthis use to threaten global trade and the lives of innocent mariners, and are in response to a series of illegal, dangerous and destabilizing Houthi actions since previous coalition strikes,” the statement said, referring to major attacks by the United States and Britain last month.The attacks were the second-largest salvo since the allies first struck Houthi targets on Jan. 11. They came after a week in which the Houthis had been particularly defiant, launching several attack drones and cruise and ballistic missiles at merchant vessels and U.S. Navy warships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.The American-led air and naval strikes began last month in response to dozens of Houthi drone and missile attacks against commercial shipping in the Red Sea since November. The Houthis claim their attacks are in protest of Israel’s military campaign against Hamas in Gaza.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