Funeral of 3 siblings killed in Russian strike underscores mounting toll on Ukrainian families
KOROSTYSHIV, Ukraine — Three coffins — one adult-sized, one medium and one child-sized — lay Wednesday inside the Soviet-era Palace of Culture in this northern Ukrainian city, surrounded by dozens of bouquets as a church choir sang farewell prayers.
Hundreds of residents stood in grim silence. Some wept quietly. Others broke down completely.
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New York Times
7 minutes ago
- New York Times
Trump Administration Live Updates: President and Musk Spar Over Policy Bill as Their Relationship Frays
As Germany's chancellor, Friedrich Merz, sat beside him watching in silence, President Trump compared Russia and Ukraine to two fighting children who needed to work out their differences for a while before anyone could intervene. 'Sometimes you see two young children fighting like crazy,' Mr. Trump said on Thursday in an Oval Office news conference. 'They hate each other, and they're fighting in a park, and you try and pull them apart. They don't want to be pulled. Sometimes you're better off letting them fight for a while and then pulling them apart.' 'And I gave that analogy to Putin yesterday,' Mr. Trump added. 'I said, 'President, maybe you have to keep fighting and suffering a lot, because both sides are suffering, before you pull them apart, before they're able to be pulled apart.'' Mr. Merz, who became Germany's chancellor last month, had come to Washington hoping to persuade Mr. Trump to play a more active role in defending Ukraine by bringing unrivaled U.S. power to the task of forcing Russia to end its invasion of its smaller neighbor. But he got a very different response. Mr. Trump essentially threw up his hands, saying that there was nothing the United States could do right now to bring the Russia-Ukraine war to an end. Mr. Trump repeatedly promised during the presidential campaign that he could make peace between the warring nations within 24 hours, but he now says he was being sarcastic. Four months into his second term, Mr. Trump is talking about the war as if he is a bystander. When a reporter asked him at Thursday's news conference whether he was going to put more sanctions on Russia, as he had previously threatened, Mr. Trump equivocated. He suggested he would know when the moment had arrived to pile on more pressure, but that it hadn't yet. He also suggested that Ukraine might come in for punishment. 'We'll be very, very, very tough, and it could be on both countries to be honest,' Mr. Trump said. 'You know, it takes two to tango.' The exchange was notable because Mr. Trump has said very little about the Russia-Ukraine war in recent weeks and almost nothing about Ukraine's stunning drone attack over the weekend against nuclear-capable bombers inside Russia. After calling Mr. Putin 'absolutely crazy' last month, Mr. Trump shifted his tone and said he wanted to give the Russian leader 'two weeks' to show signs of progress. He then dropped the timeline altogether in his statement on social media on Wednesday, instead simply relaying Mr. Putin's intent to retaliate against Ukraine as if he was a commentator without a stake in the outcome. Mr. Trump continued in that vein on Thursday, despite a plea from Mr. Merz to use American power to force Russia's retreat. Mr. Merz reminded the president that the anniversary of the D-Day operation was Friday, June 6, 'when the Americans once ended a war in Europe.' 'And I think this is in your hand, in specific, in ours,' Mr. Merz added. Mr. Trump interjected with a joke about the Nazis. 'That was not a pleasant day for you,' he said, referring to America's defeat of Adolf Hitler. Mr. Merz countered that, 'in the long run, Mr. President, this was the liberation of my country from Nazi dictatorship.' 'We know what we owe you,' he added, 'but this is the reason why I'm saying that America is, again, in a very strong position to do something on this war and ending this war.' Mr. Trump made no commitments. Instead, he boasted about the U.S. economy and military recruitment numbers under his leadership. And then he compared the war to children fighting, or a hockey game. 'They fight, fight, fight,' he said. 'Sometimes you let them fight for a little while. You see it in hockey. You see it in sports. The referees let them go for a couple of seconds. Let them go for a little while before you pull them apart.' Mr. Trump said he told Mr. Putin: 'Don't do it. You shouldn't do it. You should stop it.' But he did not seem confident that his words had any effect. In the president's telling, Mr. Putin replied that he had no choice but to attack based on Ukraine's strikes over the weekend, and, Mr. Trump added, 'it's probably not going to be pretty.' Zolan Kanno-Youngs contributed reporting.
New York Times
17 minutes ago
- New York Times
Trump Compares Russia and Ukraine to Children Fighting
As Germany's chancellor, Friedrich Merz, sat beside him watching in silence, President Trump compared Russia and Ukraine to two fighting children who needed to work out their differences for a while before anyone could intervene. 'Sometimes you see two young children fighting like crazy,' Mr. Trump said on Thursday in an Oval Office news conference. 'They hate each other, and they're fighting in a park, and you try and pull them apart. They don't want to be pulled. Sometimes you're better off letting them fight for a while and then pulling them apart.' 'And I gave that analogy to Putin yesterday,' Mr. Trump added. 'I said, 'President, maybe you have to keep fighting and suffering a lot, because both sides are suffering, before you pull them apart, before they're able to be pulled apart.'' Mr. Merz, who became Germany's chancellor last month, had come to Washington hoping to persuade Mr. Trump to play a more active role in defending Ukraine by bringing unrivaled U.S. power to the task of forcing Russia to end its invasion of its smaller neighbor. But he got a very different response. Mr. Trump essentially threw up his hands, saying that there was nothing the United States could do right now to bring the Russia-Ukraine war to an end. Mr. Trump repeatedly promised during the presidential campaign that he could make peace between the warring nations within 24 hours, but he now says he was being sarcastic. Four months into his second term, Mr. Trump is talking about the war as if he is a bystander. When a reporter asked him at Thursday's news conference whether he was going to put more sanctions on Russia, as he had previously threatened, Mr. Trump equivocated. He suggested he would know when the moment had arrived to pile on more pressure, but that it hadn't yet. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Atlantic
2 hours ago
- Atlantic
Ukraine Got a Major Battle Victory. Trump Is Not Happy.
Ukraine's drone strikes deep into Russia delivered a humiliating blow to Moscow last weekend. Kyiv's defenders celebrated the attack as a triumph of modern warfare and a warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin. But the extraordinary operation got a different response inside the White House: anger. Donald Trump has openly vented in recent weeks about Putin's unwillingness to end the war. But since Sunday's attack, which hit a series of Russian military airfields, the president has privately expressed frustration that the strike could escalate the conflict, according to three administration officials and an outside adviser to the White House. (They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.) These sources told me that the drone strike has reignited the president's long-held displeasure with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and prompted a new debate in the White House about whether the United States should abandon Ukraine. Throughout the war, Trump has deemed Zelensky a 'bad guy' and a 'hothead,' the outside adviser said—someone who could be pushing the globe toward World War III. Trump privately echoed a right-wing talking point this week by criticizing Zelensky for supposedly showboating after the drone attacks; according to the adviser, Trump was impressed with the audacity of the strikes but believes that Zelensky's focus should have been on Ukraine-Russia negotiations in Istanbul. Trump spoke with Putin yesterday, and, in a readout of the call on Truth Social, the U.S. president relayed the Kremlin's plans to strike back against Ukraine. 'We discussed the attack on Russia's docked airplanes, by Ukraine, and also various other attacks that have been taking place by both sides,' Trump wrote. 'It was a good conversation, but not a conversation that will lead to immediate Peace. President Putin did say, and very strongly, that he will have to respond to the recent attack on the airfields.' Trump did not say whether he had warned Putin against retaliating, and two of the administration officials told me that he has not decided on his next steps. Officials have presented him with options that include sanctioning Russia and reducing American aid to Ukraine. Meanwhile, Trump told aides this week that he does not believe a summit with him, Zelensky, and Putin—which he once hoped would be a way to bring the war to a close—will happen any time soon, one of the administration officials told me. Trump, who on the campaign trail last year vowed to end the war within his first 24 hours in office, made a renewed push for a peace deal last month. While Zelensky agreed to an immediate cease-fire, Putin rejected the offer and ratcheted up his bombing of Ukrainian cities. That led Trump to threaten to walk away from peace talks, and to flash some rare ire at Putin. The president had hoped that some progress would be made in this week's talks in Turkey, but the meeting was overshadowed by the drone strikes and went nowhere. The White House has said that the U.S. was not told in advance about the surprise attack, which was carried out by drones hidden across five of Russia's time zones that hit nuclear-capable bombers and inflicted billions of dollars in damage, according to a preliminary estimate from the White House. Steve Bannon and other influential MAGA voices have berated Ukraine for the attack and are attempting to push Washington further from Kyiv. On his podcast this week, Bannon blamed Ukraine for, in his view, sabotaging peace talks while potentially provoking a massive response from Russia. 'Zelensky didn't give the president of the United States a heads-up to say he's going to do a deep strike into strategic forces of Russia, which is going up the escalatory ladder as quickly as you can, on the day before your meeting in Turkey?' Bannon said. 'On the eve of peace talks or cease-fire talks, he takes the Japanese role in Pearl Harbor—the sneak attack.' Bannon has conveyed similar messages to senior West Wing advisers, a fourth administration official told me. Keith Kellogg, Trump's Ukraine envoy, warned on Fox News that 'the risk levels are going way up' because the drones struck part of Russia's 'national survival system'—its nuclear program—potentially pushing Moscow to retaliate in significant ways. Trump has not increased aid to Ukraine since taking office again in January, and he has yet to endorse a bipartisan Senate push, led by his ally Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, to impose harsh economic penalties against Russia and countries that do business with it. There have been other recent signs that the White House is distancing itself from Ukraine, too. Yesterday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did not attend a meeting of 50 defense ministers at NATO headquarters in Brussels. In the past, the meeting has been an important venue for coordinating military aid for Ukraine. Hegseth was the first U.S. defense secretary to skip the event in three years. The Pentagon cited scheduling issues for his absence. When I asked a White House spokesperson for comment about the drone strikes, she pointed me to Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt's briefing-room remarks on Tuesday, when Leavitt said that Trump 'wants this war to end at the negotiating table, and he has made that clear to both leaders, both publicly and privately.' In public remarks about the strikes, Putin downplayed the chances of a cease-fire, asking, 'Who has negotiations with terrorists?' But Zelensky told reporters that the operation over the weekend, code-named Spider's Web, would not have been carried out if Putin had agreed to a U.S.-proposed truce. 'If there had been a cease-fire, would the operation have taken place?' Zelensky asked. 'No.' Exasperated with the conflict, Trump continues to muse about walking away from any sort of diplomatic solution. In his Truth Social post about his call with Putin, the president seemed eager to change the subject to focus on ending a different international crisis. 'We also discussed Iran,' Trump wrote about ongoing talks regarding Tehran's nuclear ambitions. 'President Putin suggested that he will participate in the discussions with Iran and that he could, perhaps, be helpful in getting this brought to a rapid conclusion.'
