For people in eastern Ukraine, where nightly Russian drone strikes overwhelm overwhelmed army air defenses, the response by Western allies to Iran’s airstrike on Israel this weekend produced uncomfortable comparisons.
The armies of the United States, Britain, France and others intervened to help Israel defend itself against an attack by more than 300 Iranian drones and missiles, almost all of which were intercepted. A similar number of aerial weapons are fired at Ukraine weekly, its officials say, and many of the drones in those strikes were designed by Iran and now produced by Russia.
Since the beginning of this year, Russia has fired 1,000 missiles, 2,800 drones and 7,000 guided aerial bombs at Ukraine, according to Ukraine’s permanent representative to the United Nations, Sergiy Kyslytsya. While Washington and other allies have provided Kiev with some powerful air defense weapons, they have not directly confronted Russian forces, and Ukrainian officials have long argued that the weapons supplied are insufficient to counter Moscow’s threat.
In the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, where 1.3 million people live with air raid alarms every night, many people expressed anger and disappointment over the weekend that Ukraine’s allies, fearful of provoking Russia, They do not provide him with the same protection that they gave Israel.
“When rockets fly in Israel, the whole world writes about it,” said Amil Nasirov, a 29-year-old singer. “Rockets fly here and we don’t have American bombers to save the sky like in Israel.”
“It’s very stupid; It is hypocrisy,” he added. “And it’s like a devaluation of Ukrainian lives.”
Ukraine has asked since the start of Russia’s large-scale invasion in February 2022 for more tools to close its skies to Russian missiles. But the first Patriot missile systems from the United States and Germany (the only proven defense against ballistic missiles) did not arrive until spring 2023.
Ukraine also advocated for F-16 fighter jets, which the Biden administration, which must approve any transfer of U.S.-made aircraft, long resisted providing for fear Moscow would see it as escalation.
He eventually relented, but Ukrainian pilots are still training on the systems and are not expected to fly in Ukraine’s skies until this summer.
Ukrainian officials pointed to the role fighter jets played in Israel’s defense as a sign of their importance in air defense.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said the response to the Iranian attack was clear evidence that “the world has everything it needs to stop any missiles, Shahed drones and other forms of terror,” referring to the Iranian-made attack drones that have been a large part of Russia’s arsenal.
“The whole world sees what true defense is. See that it is feasible. And the whole world saw that Israel was not alone in this defense: its allies were also eliminating the threat in the sky,” Zelensky said in his final evening speech.
Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Cameron said on Monday that while his country has been one of Ukraine’s strongest military supporters – training thousands of troops and providing tanks and other advanced weapons – Britain could not shoot down Russian drones over Ukraine because it could inflame a broader war in Europe.
“If you want to avoid escalation in terms of a wider European war, I think the only thing you have to avoid is NATO troops directly engaging Russian troops,” Cameron told British radio station LBC. “That would be an escalation hazard.”
The United States remains the main supplier of ammunition for Ukraine’s best air defense systems. But the last time Congress approved military aid for Ukraine was in October. In the intervening months, Ukraine’s air defenses have been critically depleted, while Russia has become more successful in using airpower to advance the front line, attack Ukraine’s energy grid, and inflict more civilian casualties.
At least 126 people were killed and 478 more wounded in Russian attacks in March, a 20 percent increase compared to the previous month, according to the United Nations.
Liubov Sholudko contributed to this report from Kharkiv, Ukraine.
