Eight-year-old Andrii and his six-year-old brother Maksym’s wooden fort is covered with cloth netting.
Protection, they said, from the drones fired from Russia.
The children, who live just 15 kilometres from the Russian border in the north-eastern Kharkiv region, play with plastic guns.
They scamper through abandoned trenches and the charred shells of armoured vehicles, and keep watch from their makeshift fort.The brothers hang out and play at the makeshift fort with the few other children left at their frontline village. (Reuters: Violeta Santos Moura)
When fighting intensifies, their mother Varvara Tupkalenko takes them back to the family’s apartment in nearby kharkiv, the regional capital.
But Ukraine’s second city itself is a major target, and the swarms of drones that pound it at night terrify the boys.
“The kids keep crying, asking to come back to the village,” Ms Tupkalenko said.
Over 700 drones in one onslaught
Russian forces launched 728 drones and 13 missiles on the night of July 8, according to US think tank the Institute for the Study of War.It was the largest combined drone and missile strike of the war and about a 34 per cent increase from the previous record high of 550 earlier this month.
Lutsk, a city that’s home to airfields used by the Ukrainian army, was the hardest hit, according to Mr Zelenskyy.
It lies near the border with Poland in western Ukraine, a region that is a crucial hub for receiving foreign military aid.
Another 10 regions were struck, killing one person in the Khmelnytskyi area, and wounding two in Kyiv, officials said.
Kyiv’s military downed almost all the drones, but some of the six hypersonic missiles caused unspecified damage.
The attack came just days after US President donald Trump announced that arms shipments to Ukraine would resume,and aimed unusually sharp criticism at Russian President Vladimir Putin.
A day later, hours before a conference in Rome at which Kyiv won billions of dollars in aid pledges, Kyiv was struck with a record bombardment.
It lasted for nearly 10 hours, killing two people and wounding 26, according to figures from the national emergency services.## More drones with new upgrades
The Ukrainian capital of 3 million people has endured several consecutive weeks of escalating Russian attacks.
Civilians say they face nightly terror, kept awake by air raid sirens and endless booms of explosions.
“Most people don’t even sleep in our beds anymore,” Kyiv-based journalist Emmanuelle Chaze told ABC The World.
“There’s a constant state of stress and worry that something will drop on you in the middle of the night.”
Russia’s defence ministry said it had hit “military-industrial” targets in kyiv as well as military airfields.
It denies targeting civilians although towns and cities have been hit regularly in the war and thousands have been killed.
June saw the highest monthly civilian casualty count in Ukraine since the Russian invasion began in February 2022, according to UN data.
It said it reflected a “worsening trend”, with 6,754 civilians killed or injured in the first half of 2025 – a sharp 54 per cent rise compared to the same period in 2024.
Kyiv residents were forced to shelter in underground locations during Russia’s attacks. (AP: Evgeniy maloletka)
“Then they programmed to dive straight down a bit like a dive bomber, which makes that harder to hit as well,” Professor Sussex said.
Ukrainian Air Force spokesperson Colonel Yuriy Ihnat reported that Russian forces used more then 400 decoy drones in a record strike on July 8 in order to overwhelm air defences.
Two women stand in front of a building damaged in strikes, one wearing a robe. (Reuters: Vyacheslav Madiyevskyy)
Ukraine pushed for ‘biting sanctions’
professor Sussex said improving the situation for Ukraine would depend on how much europe could come to the table, and whether Russia could keep its economy on a war footing.
This week, Ukraine’s allies pledged more than 10 billion euros ($17.8 billion) to help rebuild the country, and the EU announced another 2.3 billion euros in support.
Mr Trump has signalled willingness to send more Patriot air-defence missiles, which have proven critical to defending against fast-moving russian ballistic missiles.## Resignation and Acceptance: A Moment of Stillness
the weight of inevitability settled upon her as she uttered the words, “I can’t change anything, then went to work.” This declaration, shared while simply awaiting public transportation, encapsulates a profound sense of resignation. it speaks to the common human experience of confronting limitations and proceeding with daily life despite them.
### The Quietude of Acceptance
Following that statement, a simple, yet powerful phrase concluded her thought: “that’s it.” This brevity underscores the completeness of her acceptance. It isn’t a statement of joy, nor one of defeat, but rather a quiet acknowledgement of circumstances.
Recent studies in behavioral psychology suggest that individuals who practice radical acceptance – fully acknowledging reality as it is,without resistance – experience lower levels of stress and anxiety[[1]]. This woman’s words,though minimal,demonstrate a similar principle in action. She isn’t battling the unchangeable; she is simply *being* with it, and moving forward.
The scene itself – a bus stop – is symbolic. A bus stop is a place of transition,of waiting,and of shared,often unspoken,experiences. It’s a microcosm of life, where individuals from diverse backgrounds momentarily converge before continuing on their separate journeys. Her quiet acceptance within this transient space highlights the universality of her experience.
Worth a look