NATO member scrambles fighter jets as Russian attack on Ukraine kills 8
Poland, the closest NATO member to the Ukraine-Russia war, scrambled fighter jets and placed its air defenses on high alert early Thursday as Russia launched more than 70 missiles and roughly 280 drones across Ukraine, killing at least eight and wounding dozens from Kyiv to the western city of Lviv.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, just returning from this week’s U.S. visit with President Donald Trump and the funeral of late Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said the barrage exposed a critical shortage of Western-supplied interceptors, particularly against ballistic missiles.
“The protection of people’s lives depends directly on their willingness” to provide Ukraine with air-defense missiles, Zelenskyy said of Kyiv’s allies.
Hours later Thursday morning, the European Union disbursed $4 billion to Ukraine to finance the procurement of more drones, missiles, air defense and fighter jets, according to the European Commission.
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The disbursement is part of a more than $100 billion loan approved by the EU earlier this year and follows the roughly $3.5 billion installment on June 25 and $4.5 billion on June 30.
Polish forces detected an unidentified object moving west through the country’s airspace shortly before 4 a.m. An F-16 was dispatched to intercept it, but the object disappeared from radar minutes later. Authorities subsequently found a crater about 33 feet wide and scattered debris in farmland near Tarnawa-Kolonia, about 1.2 miles from the closest buildings.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said initial evidence indicated the object was a Russian Kh-101 missile, although investigators were still working to confirm its type and origin.
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“All the indications are that it was a Russian Kh-101,” Tusk said, adding that Polish forces were prepared to shoot it down if it had continued flying toward a populated area.
He added the U.S. is interested in joining the investigation, which has initially determined the missile was not intended for Poland territory. The fate of the Ukraine-Russian war might be decided within the next 100 days, Tusk told reporters.
The threat to a NATO ally is a new frontier in the long-running war and comes after Zelenskyy pressed senators to advance Graham’s sweeping sanctions package. Also, Trump and Zelenskyy discussed U.S. licenses allowing Ukraine to produce Patriot interceptors, along with other defense cooperation and efforts to revive stalled diplomacy with Moscow.
Six people, including two girls ages 5 and 12, were killed when a Russian Iskander-M ballistic missile struck a private home housing a large family near Kryvyi Rih, according to local officials. Seven others were reported killed in Kyiv and elsewhere in the Dnipropetrovsk and Poltava regions as the casualty count rose during rescue operations.
“A dark night,” Oleksandr Vilkul, the head of Kryvyi Rih’s defense council, wrote on Telegram. Eight people were wounded in the strike on the home.
The person killed in Kyiv was a 31-year-old man, while two others were wounded, according to Ukrainian police. Russian strikes damaged residential buildings, vehicles, storage facilities, a market and a garage complex in the capital, where air raid warnings lasted more than five hours and thousands of residents sheltered in subway stations.
In Lviv, about 40 miles from the Polish border, emergency crews searched damaged apartment buildings for people trapped beneath concrete and debris. Thirty people, including children, were reported injured. More than 20 residential buildings, a school and two kindergartens were damaged, officials said.
“I was terrified watching the rescuers go beneath those concrete slabs,” one Lviv resident told Reuters as crews pulled a boy from a damaged building.
Ukraine’s air force said its defenses intercepted 55 missiles and 265 drones. But only one of nine ballistic missiles was shot down, while 11 missiles and 17 drones struck targets at 20 locations.
The U.S.-made Patriot is the only system currently in Ukraine’s arsenal capable of reliably intercepting Russian ballistic missiles, which travel at several times the speed of sound. Zelenskyy has repeatedly warned that Patriot interceptors are arriving too slowly and in insufficient numbers.
During his Tuesday meeting with Trump, Zelenskyy said the leaders discussed licenses for Patriot interceptor production in Ukraine. He also met with Lockheed Martin executives and told senators that domestic production would be a long-term solution but would not address Ukraine’s immediate shortage of missiles. European countries have offered to pay for additional U.S.-made interceptors.
Zelenskyy’s Washington visit coincided with Senate consideration of the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026, named for the longtime defense hawk and outspoken Ukraine supporter who died unexpectedly earlier this month.
The Senate voted 86-12 Tuesday to clear an initial procedural hurdle and voted 84-12 Wednesday to formally proceed with the legislation. Additional votes were still required before final passage.
The package would impose sanctions on Russian officials, oligarchs, financial institutions, energy projects and vessels accused of helping Moscow evade existing restrictions. It would also authorize tariffs of up to 100% on goods from the five largest purchasers of Russian oil and natural gas and the leading countries facilitating sanctions evasion.
Graham negotiated the revised package with the White House shortly before his death. The legislation also includes an extension of sanctions targeting Iran’s energy and weapons sectors, a provision sought by the Trump administration.
Zelenskyy met with a bipartisan group of senators before the procedural votes and called the legislation an important signal to Russia, Europe and the Ukrainian people. He watched the Senate vote from the chamber’s gallery after attending Graham’s funeral at Washington National Cathedral.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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