Russians are willfully adding Insult to Injury

If it were only a few drones and missiles. If it were only one or two towns. If it were only one or two apartment buildings. If it were only one or two attacks per week. If it were only injured civilians but not a dozen killed and 100-plus injured in Russia’s latest attack.

Each sentence could be followed by words such as tens, dozens, many, hundreds. Russia has stepped up its aerial campaign against Ukrainian towns and civilians to cruel proportions. Every night residents of Kyiv with children of all ages in tow along and the elderly rush to the basement shelters as Russia rains drones and ballistic missiles on unarmed residents’ homes.

Russia attacked Ukraine’s capital with missiles and drones overnight, killing at least a dozen people, including a 6-year-old boy, and wounding 124 others, authorities said Thursday, July 31.

Ten children, the youngest being a 5-month-old girl, were among the wounded, Kyiv City Military Administration head Tymur Tkachenko said. A large part of a nine-story residential building collapsed after it was struck, he said.

The nighttime attack targeted the Kyiv, Dnipro, Poltava, Sumy, Mykolaiv regions, with Ukraine’s capital being the primary target, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram.

“Today, the world once again saw Russia’s answer to our desire for peace with America and Europe,” Zelenskyy said. “New demonstrative killings. That is why peace without strength is impossible.”

He called on Ukraine’s allies to follow through on defense commitments and pressure Moscow toward real negotiations.

While Russian cutthroats in uniforms aren’t able to make headway on the ground against the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Moscow is focusing on killing Ukrainians – the elderly, mothers and children – in their residences in hopes of demoralizing the nation. However, numerous comments by officials and the man and woman in the street indicate that Russia can’t meet even this goal.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian drones struck multiple targets across Russia at the same time, including an industrial facility in the western Russian city of Penza and energy infrastructure in Volgograd Oblast, according to Russian officials and media.

Penza lies roughly 625 kilometers (388 miles) southeast of Moscow and about 600 kilometers (373 miles) from the nearest Ukraine-controlled territory.

Without disclosing the nature of the facility, Penza Oblast Gov. Oleg Melnichenko confirmed the attack, saying that a fire had occurred at an industrial plant.

“There is a fire at the plant, which is being extinguished,” he said.

The strikes come amid Ukraine’s intensified campaign targeting Russian military, industrial, and logistical infrastructure deep inside Russia.

Among recent lighter articles about the Russo-Ukraine War, President Donald Trump has had his fill of Russian x-president Dmitri Medvedev’s lambasting of Ukraine and the White House. Medvedev has been regularly threatening the United States with nuclear annihilation because of the White House’s welcome change of heart about Russia and Putin.

According to several news reports, Trump warned: “Tell Medvedev, the failed ex-president of Russia who still thinks he’s president, to watch what he says,” Trump wrote. “Because he’s stepping into very dangerous territory.”

On July 28, frustrated by Moscow’s relentless, wanton bombardment of civilian centers across numerous cities, Trump said that the new deadline for Russia to agree to a peace deal with Ukraine will expire in “10–12 days from today.”

That same day, Medvedev posted on X (formerly Twitter) that Trump was “heading for war with Russia”: “Trump is playing a game of ultimatums with Russia: 50 days or 10... He must remember two things: Russia is not Israel or even Iran. Every new ultimatum is a threat and a step toward war. Not between Russia and Ukraine, but with his own country. Don’t go down Sleepy Joe’s path,” Medvedev wrote, referring to ex-president Joe Biden.

On July 31, Trump has made clear that he wants a deal to end Russia’s war in Ukraine by August 8, the United States told the United Nations Security Council on Thursday.

In the wake of this latest deadly attack, Zelenskyy called for a “regime change” in Russia. Noting that “peace without strength is impossible,” Zelenskyy urged Western partners to use all available tools, including the confiscation of Russian assets, to compel Moscow to negotiate.

A “regime change” or the elimination of Putin and his cabal will certainly lead to mass confusion and chaos in Russia, which may be long enough for Ukraine to rebuild its country and for Russians to ponder their future.