Ukraine war: One of the fiercest battles of the conflict is intensifying as volunteers work to evacuate civilians

Published

2 years ago

February 21, 2023

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The Ukrainian soldiers fired an American round from a French mortar at a common enemy.

They said the target was a storage site for Russian munitions close to the city of Bakhmut, in eastern Ukraine, where one of the fiercest battles of the war is intensifying.

“Fire!” yelled one of the troops.

Ukraine war latest: Putin says West ‘released genie from bottle’

A soldier, kneeling down, pulled a metal cord that triggered the MO-120 rifled towed mortar – a Cold War-era weapon with a new purpose.

It blasted the round into the cloudy sky and over snow-covered fields.

A third soldier stepped forward holding a second M1101 mortar round – shaped like a mini green rocket.

He dropped it down the barrel so the weapon could be fired again.

They launched three rounds in total before quickly moving to a more sheltered position – all too aware of the risk of Russian forces firing back.

An officer from the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Brigade, said his troops would win despite being pitched against much larger numbers of mercenaries as well as Russian soldiers along this frontline.

Situation ‘looks like the First or the Second World War’

Senior Lieutenant Yaroslav described how waves of Wagner mercenaries would be ordered to advance despite running directly into Ukrainian fire.

“When our fighters saw this, they were super surprised,” he said. “What is happening near Bakhmut looks like the First or the Second World War, with people [mercenaries] running forward, straight upright [rather than ducking low]… They have nothing to lose.”

At an artillery position a 15-minute drive from the mortar site, Sky News met troops keeping warm from the freezing temperatures in a makeshift bunker accessed via a short trench.

The men, seated on a line of wooden planks that framed the cramped, underground chamber, wore white-coloured waterproof tops and trousers over their combat gear to make them harder for the Russians to spot when they were outside in the snow.

‘I’m feeling fury and I want to win in this war’

Two of them described how they only joined the military after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion almost exactly a year ago.

“I’m feeling fury and I want to win in this war,” said one of the servicemen, called Bohdan, who spoke in broken English.

Asked if he felt scared, he said: “No, I’m in my country. I save my country.”

A second soldier, Artem, said: “I joined this war in March. Then, I had energy and motivation, and the same now. Nothing’s changed.”

As for what the toughest part was about living in trenches, he joked: “Digging. It’s the hardest thing. You have to dig constantly. Dig and dig.”

Russian forces inching slowly forwards

Despite Ukraine focusing significant firepower on fending off attempts to seize Bakhmut, Russian forces do seem to be inching slowly forward after months of bloody clashes.

One sign of this advance can be felt in the nearby town of Chasiv Yar – which would be next in Moscow’s path should Bakhmut fall.

It has started to come under Russian shelling, prompting many residents to flee.

More than 10 people have been killed, according to the local mayor, Serhiy Chaus, who described the situation as “hard but stable”.

Asked if he was worried the Russians might capture the town, he said: “Who isn’t worried? Of course, we are worried, but as they say, ‘We believe in the Armed Forces of Ukraine’.”

Teams working to evacuate civilians from risk areas

The growing risk means evacuation teams are driving in and out every day to rescue those unable to leave by themselves because of age, poor health or a lack of transport.

We met one group of civilian volunteers – four young men who said they wanted to be useful despite the danger – about 10 miles further back in the city of Kostiantynivka, which has become a staging post for those seeking to push forward.

Donning body armour, helmets and tourniquets, they climbed into two minibuses – one purple, the other yellow – and set off with aid parcels and the names of prospective evacuees.

‘I am trying to be brave’

One of the men, 31-year-old Oleksiy Zabrodin, who used to run a small business selling briquettes before the war, said he felt a little bit scared “but I am trying to be brave”.

Speaking in English, he added: “I understand it is important for our people. It’s our country.”

The volunteers pulled up outside a culture centre in Chasiv Yar, which had been turned into a distribution point for aid.
A small line of residents stood outside the front door, waiting to pick up basic supplies, such as pasta and bags of oats.

The team unloaded cardboard boxes of food and medicine before heading to the first evacuation address, taking just one of the minibuses.

‘We abandoned everything’

Wrapped in a bright red coat and orange headscarf, Nina, 73, was waiting at her bungalow on a narrow residential lane covered in snow.

She said her home had been shelled four times and she was scared for her life.

One of the volunteers took her by the hand and gently guided her into the vehicle, while others collected up some items she wanted to bring in a few bags.

Her daughter, Svitlana, sat with her mother to offer support as the minibus drove off.

Both women were crying.

“Don’t you know how people feel when they abandon everything that they worked hard towards for years?” the daughter sobbed.

Nina said: “We abandoned everything… The house is smashed.”

The volunteers worked as quickly as possible because of the risk of more shells landing.

A simple act of affection

They stopped at a second, tiny, single-storey house, where 83-year-old Maria and her husband lived.

She could not walk and seemed very confused.

The volunteers carefully carried her out on a stretcher, while her husband followed on foot – a few of their belongings also packaged up in bags.

Once in the minibus, the elderly man offered his wife a hand to clasp as she lay on the backseat – a simple act of affection to ease the disorientation.

Forced to leave

The final stop, before heading out of Chasiv Yar to relative safety, was back at the culture centre to pick up a few more residents wanting to flee.

Among those climbing on board the minibus was another woman called Svitlana, with her seven-year-old daughter, Maria, wearing a large, silver puffer jacket to fend off the cold.

“Life and the situation forced us to leave,” the mother said.

Asked how she was feeling, the young girl said: “Bad.”

As for what she wished for, she just said: “Peace.”

World

Stakes high for Trump-Putin summit as Zelenskyy faces nightmare deal

Published

3 hours ago

August 10, 2025

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Stakes high for Trump-Putin summit as Zelenskyy faces nightmare deal

For Ukraine – its exhausted, brave soldiers, its thousands of bereaved families mourning their dead, and its beleaguered president – it is exactly what they feared it would be.

They fear the compromise they will be forced to make will be messy, costly, unfair and ultimately beneficial to the invading tyrant who brought death and destruction to their sovereign land.

Six weeks ago, I spoke to President Zelenskyy in London.

War latest: Team Trump ‘risk being out of their depth’ at Putin meeting

I put it to him in our Sky News interview that Presidents Trump and Putin were heading towards making a deal between themselves, a grand bargain, in which Ukraine was but one piece on the chessboard.

Zelenskyy smiled as if to acknowledge the reality ahead.

He paused and then he said this: “We are not going to be a card in talks between great nations, and we will never accept that… I definitely do not want to see global deals between America and Russia.

“We don’t need it. We are a separate story, a victim of Russian aggression and we will not reward it.”

It was a response that betrayed his greatest fear – that this will become essentially a Trump negotiation in which Zelenskyy and Ukraine will be told “take it or leave it”.

And, by the way, if you “leave it”, then it will be painful.

Harsh realities

It’s the prospect that now confronts Zelenskyy as Trump and Putin plough ahead on a course that has clear attractions for both of them.

Of course, Zelenskyy is right to say there can be no deal without Ukraine. But there are harsh realities at play here.

Trump wants a deal on Ukraine – any deal – that he can chalk up as a win. He wants it badly and he wants it now.

It’s the impediment to a broader strategic deal with Putin and he wants it out of the way. It’s what he does, and it’s the way he does it. And President Putin knows it.

He knows Trump, he sees an opportunity in Trump, and he can’t get across Russia to Alaska fast enough. He will be back at global diplomacy’s top table.

Always a deal to be done

Make no mistake, when Trump says he just wants to stop the killing, he means it. Such wanton loss of young lives offends him. He keeps saying it.

He sees war, by and large, as an unnecessary waste of life and of money. Deals are there to be done. There’s always a deal.

Sadly for Ukraine, in this case, it is unlikely to be a fair deal.

How can any deal be “fair” when you are the victim of outrageous brutality and heinous crimes.

But it may well be the deal they have to take unless they want to fight an increasingly one-sided war with much less help from Trump and America.

A senior UK diplomat told me if things turn out as feared, it should not be called a land-for-peace deal. It should be called annexation “because that’s what it is”.

But here’s the rub.

Peace, calm, the end of the nightly terror of war has much to recommend it. In short, a bad peace can often seem better than no peace. But, ultimately, rewarded dictators always come back for more.

If Ukraine has to accept a bad peace, then it will want clear security guarantees to make sure it cannot happen again.

It is the very least they deserve.

There is much at stake in Alaska.

World

Desperation only grows in Gaza, as crowds swell at protests in Israel

Published

3 hours ago

August 10, 2025

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Desperation only grows in Gaza, as crowds swell at protests in Israel

As if life in Gaza wasn’t hard enough, there is now a heatwave – compounding the problems of minimal water, food and the basics you need to keep a family alive.

To keep your children halfway clean, when you’ve been displaced over and over again, forced to live under tarpaulin rammed up against your neighbours.

“We suffer greatly, especially because we live in tents,” says Riham Akel, who was displaced from the north and now lives in Gaza City.

“They are made of cloth and plastic that do not protect us from the heat. In addition, there is no electricity, drinking water or water for washing, no fans or air conditioning.”

Given Israel’s planned takeover of Gaza City – and the evacuation of the 800,000 or so people now living there – it’s likely she’ll be forced to move again.

In Hostages Square in Tel Aviv, the crowds have swelled these past two Saturdays – almost doubling after Hamas published propaganda videos showing two of the remaining hostages starving in captivity – and now this week, Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to push ahead with full security control of the Gaza Strip.

People here just want it to stop.

Yael said: “I feel like a hostage in my own country, as though no one listens to me – 80% of the citizens don’t want it anymore.”

“When you talk about the government it’s not only Gaza,” says David Solomon. “They are trying to undermine the democracy in Israel, they’re trying willingly to destroy the whole of Israel, they don’t care just for another year or two of their survival.”

There are also calls for IDF soldiers to refuse to carry out Netanyahu’s plan to take over Gaza City.

Another major point of contention is what many see as the failure of the International Red Cross to bring food to the hostages. Food for the Palestinians in Gaza is not much discussed, except for a small group on the fringes.

“We believe that the Israeli public is ignorant on purpose,” says Gilad Melzer – holding up a sign saying “Stop Genocide” with a photo of a starving child.

“Some of it wants to stay ignorant and some, the government wants to keep them ignorant of what is going on in Gaza and they’re ignorant as well of what is going on in the occupied territories.”

Benjamin Netanyahu seems to have made up his mind, though. He will ramp up the fight, despite international outcry, despite the opposition of his military leadership and despite the tens of thousands who rally each week in Hostages Square, hoping someone in government will bother to listen.

There is a sense of hopelessness here – that the solidarity of numbers still makes so little difference.

World

Gaza ‘injured his soul’: Israeli soldier died by suicide two days before he was due to return to duty

Published

3 hours ago

August 10, 2025

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Gaza 'injured his soul': Israeli soldier died by suicide two days before he was due to return to duty

When your son is risking his life fighting in Gaza, you don’t expect to hear news he’s been killed on a rest period at home.

Eliran Mizrahi had served 187 days as a reservist in Gaza since 8 October, before he died by suicide in June last year.

His mother Jenny has turned Eliran’s childhood bedroom into a shrine. The 40-year-old’s combat vest hanging on the wall still has sand in it from Gaza.

The cap he was wearing when he died, sits just above it on a shelf laden with memories of his life.

Israel is seeing a wave of soldiers like Eliran taking their own lives – five died by suicide just last month.

IDF (Israel Defence Forces) investigations have found it is what they have seen and done in Gaza that are the cause, according to reports by the Israeli public broadcaster.

Eliran’s mother told Sky News her son returned from Gaza a changed man and she fears there will be many more suicides among Israeli soldiers.

“He never left Gaza in his mind,” says Jenny.

“When he came back he couldn’t go back to work. He was a great father with a lot of patience. And he lost his patience with his children, with people.

“He was very silent. He didn’t sleep at night, he had nightmares. We didn’t know anything about it. He didn’t speak. Whenever we asked him he said everything is okay.”

Jenny describes Eliran as someone who was happy and friends with everyone. A father of four “with a big heart” and a big smile. But his experience of the war “injured his soul”.

Initially, he was deployed to clear bodies of people slaughtered by Hamas at the Nova Festival on 7 October and then deployed to Gaza a day later.

Eliran was active on social media and shared videos of his time in Gaza. He was commander of a unit of D9 bulldozers that destroyed buildings and tunnel shafts.

After his death, his D9 partner, Guy Zaken, told a parliamentary committee they were often shot at and they ran over hundreds of bodies.

Yet they filmed themselves smiling and singing to send to their families. Eliran shared some of those videos on social media.

Israel has levelled vast parts of Gaza. Eliran’s actions were part of a systematic campaign the UN says has damaged or destroyed over 90% of Gaza’s homes. Human rights experts warn this could be a war crime.

Eliran was pulled out of Gaza after he sustained knee injuries in an RPG (rocket-propelled grenade) attack on his bulldozer.

‘The bodies and the blood’

He was later diagnosed with PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) – we don’t know the cause of his trauma but in the end he couldn’t live with it. Two days before he was due to return to active duty, he took his own life.

“What he saw over there in Gaza injured his soul. You see all the bodies over there and all the blood. It hurts your soul,” says Eliran’s mother.

Israeli media is reporting at least 18 soldiers have taken their own lives so far this year.

Thousands are suffering with PTSD. And more and more reservists are quietly refusing to turn up for duty.

The IDF says supporting its service members is a top priority and it invests significant resources in doing so, including deploying mental health officers in all military units.

Tuly Flint was one of those officers. A clinical social worker and expert in trauma therapy in his professional life, and a lieutenant colonel in the military reserves, he was deployed to offer psychological support to troops who served in Gaza.

Last year, after treating many soldiers and becoming exposed to the extreme suffering of Gazans, Tuly came to the conclusion the war had no purpose and it was a crime against humanity. So he refused to continue to serve in the IDF.

“At the beginning of the war what we usually saw was simple PTSD. People who talk about the horrors they saw in the first few weeks with the massacre of Hamas,” says Tuly.

“But since the second month of the war, people started talking about what takes place on the Palestinian side.

“Even people that were not talking about Palestinians’ rights, or anything like that, they started talking about the fact that they saw bodies of children, of old people, of women.”

‘You think, are they lying to me’

I asked Tuly how soldiers feel hearing Benjamin Netanyahu‘s narrative that there is no starvation in Gaza – that the images we see are a lie.

The Israeli military bears witness to what is happening in Gaza in a way most of the world, including international journalists, still can’t.

“When you hear your government and your commanders telling things that are not true, you start thinking, are they lying to me also?” says Tuly.

“When you hear your prime minister lying about things that you saw in Gaza, things that you did … people talk about torching houses, people talk about a ‘deadline’ – not a metaphor – a deadline when people cross they will be killed no matter if they are children or women … they see people starving and they also see the chaos.”

After nearly two years of war, the human cost is weighing heavily on Israeli society. A majority of Israelis now believe that only a deal, not military pressure, will bring the remaining hostages home.

And the humanitarian crisis unfolding just across the border is becoming a source of public unease. Former military and intelligence chiefs are also now against the war.

The Commanders for Israel’s Security group (CIS) has argued, in its professional judgement, “Hamas no longer poses a strategic threat to Israel” – and has written to Donald Trump asking him to compel Benjamin Netanyahu to end the war.

Tuly Flint says there’s an erosion of trust between soldiers and those leading them.

“When you come back home and you hear so many people – former chiefs of staff, former heads of the security bodies of Israel – saying ‘this war has no aim anymore’ … you say to yourself: ‘I hear from former chiefs of staff that I’m killing hostages by waging war and my government is still sending me there?’

“When you see the pictures that you’ve seen with your own eyes and your government says ‘no this is a lie, no this is propaganda’, this makes you distrust everyone. And when you distrust everyone, why would you ask for help?”

The mental and moral burden on soldiers could be about to grow.

Despite strong objections from the IDF’s chief of staff, Israel is expanding military operations in Gaza with plans to take control of the entire territory.

We understand that references to suicide in any context can be difficult for some people. We provide details of support available from the Samaritans where any such references are included. You can find these here: call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK.