Kramatorsk residents took cover as the fresh wave of missiles struck, injuring many including pensioner Besti Khalilova as she and her granddaughter made their way towards a cemetery. Several individuals were struck by shrapnel from these missiles – Besti Khalilova being one such individual who sustained injuries due to her proximity to one.
Missile strikes hit both Kharkiv in western Ukraine and Dnipro in eastern Ukraine, damaging high-rise blocks of flats as well as a maternity hospital.
Moscow Missile Strike : Kostiantynivka
An attack by missile turned an outdoor market in Kostiantynivka into a burning ruin just days after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Kyiv to assess Ukraine’s three-month old counteroffensive and pledge his country’s continued assistance against Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Attackers shattered windows of buildings and left blood-smeared stores floors along with debris and rubble scattered along streets in this town located 20 kilometers west of Bakhmut where Ukrainian forces have been struggling against Russian-backed separatists for months.
President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on Twitter that Russia had launched the largest air barrage since the start of full-scale war, damaging schools, apartment blocks, Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv and Odesa, according to Maksym Kozytsky’s regional governor office in Lviv and elsewhere across Ukraine. Hypersonic ballistic and cruise missiles were launched from Kyiv, with hypersonic cruise missiles striking Lviv.
Uman
Early Monday, air raid sirens combined with gunfire from Ukraine’s air defense systems in an early morning missile barrage across the nation. According to Ukraine’s Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief, Ukrainian military systems intercepted 60 of Russia’s 76 rockets fired and hit Kyiv, Dnipro, and Uman buildings containing high-rise apartments.
Even in spite of calls by both Israel and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to refrain from attending this year’s pilgrimage, thousands of Hasidic Jews have arrived in Uman for pilgrimage despite war raging less than 300km (120 miles away. They feel safe here.
Visitors come here to remember Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav, who settled here in 1810. During World War II, Nazi soldiers murdered thousands of Jews at Sukhoi Yar, where they were shot and then interred into mass graves.
Dnipro
Dnipro, located on Ukraine’s Dnieper River banks, has become an essential logistics hub since Russia launched a full-scale invasion last February. Situated near the front line that spans from Kherson in southern coastal Ukraine through Donbas region to Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhya in central Ukraine, it acts as an attractant for displaced residents from these regions seeking jobs or homes in Dnipro.
Air raid alarms, gunfire and artillery firing no longer seem to worry them; they have accepted this new reality of living in Ukraine.
They have created an internet cafe to stay connected and work, as well as their own charity that assists displaced by war, and run a restaurant located in a circular concrete building rising from the surface of the Dnieper. Although they remain optimistic for the future, their focus remains more focused on political concerns rather than economic ones.
Odesa
Odesa’s long history as a Russian Soviet port city has fostered and preserved an eclectic blend of Ukrainian, Jewish, Russian and other cultures into one distinct identity for this city – as evidenced by its popular Seventh-Kilometer Market with its wide array of food offerings as well as unique accents heard when speaking Russian locally.
Recent strikes against southern Ukraine – including a missile strike against a warehouse which killed three workers and injured many more – is evidence that Moscow intends to damage Odesa ports essential to President Antonio Guterres and Turkey’s Erdogan’s plan for grain exports to resume and reduce global food shortages.
On Sunday night, a Russian anti-ship missile struck Odesa’s historic center and caused extensive damage, hitting Transfiguration Cathedral as well as several other historic landmarks protected by UNESCO and historical landmarks deemed significant to Odesa by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and leaving extensive debris damage behind. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty fears Moscow is trying to use this cathedral as leverage against RFE/RL journalist Alsu Kurmasheva who hails from Odesa but is being held in Russian custody by RFE/RL
