Fdd's overnight brief

Russia

Moscow’s move to slash natural-gas exports to Europe has pitched the continent’s energy crisis into a dangerous new phase that threatens to drain vital fuel supplies and kneecap the continent’s economy. – Wall Street Journal 

Ukraine’s hunt for weapons in the global defense market to help it fight Moscow’s forces is facing increasing competition from Russia, which is often looking to buy those same items or attempting to cut off Kyiv’s supply, according to government officials and arms brokers. – Wall Street Journal 

Before the war with Russia, the yearnings of Ukraine’s Hungarian minority were mostly brushed off as benign nostalgia for a time when they lived in one nation with other ethnic Hungarians. Now, divided loyalties within the tiny community — which has soaked up Hungary’s ambivalence toward Russia’s invasion — are being seen as something more worrisome by their fellow Ukrainians, some of whom fear they are susceptible to pro-Russia propaganda from Hungary. – Washington Post 

An air strike hit a building sheltering civilians in Ukraine’s embattled eastern city of Lysychansk on Thursday, killing at leastfour and wounding seven, local governor Serhiy Gaidai said. […] The governor said a separate air strike on Thursday had hit a sanatorium building in Lysychansk and collapsed it, possibly causing further casualties. – Reuters 

The claims made about the health of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who will be 70 in October, are lurid and macabre, as well as impossible to verify. But they illustrate how little is known about the health of a leader whose medical condition is fundamental to the future of Europe, all the more so after he ordered Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. – Agence France-Presse 

Ivan Krastev writes: Before the war, Moscow’s middle class and Putin’s oligarchs thought and acted as if they belonged to both the Russian and the western world. Such an “amphibious” life is no longer possible. Barricaded identities are replacing multiple affiliations. In Russia, being “Russian” is now defined by genuine or feigned public support for Putin’s war with the west. In the west, being Russian is increasingly identified with not belonging to the west. Many Russians living outside Russia today feel like exiles. – Financial Times 

Kateryna Stepanenko, Mason Clark, George Barros, and Grace Mappes write: Russian forces continued to launch ground assaults on Severodonetsk and settlements along the Ukrainian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) to Lysychansk. Ukrainian military intelligence reported that Russian forces are no longer operating as concrete battalion tactical groups (BTGs), as ISW previously assessed. Russian forces conducted unsuccessful offensive operations northwest of Slovyansk, while Ukrainian forces reportedly resumed preparations for counteroffensives west of Izyum. Russian and Ukrainian forces engaged in clashes north and northeast of Kharkiv City, though no significant territory changed hands. – Institute for the Study of War 

Afghanistan

The United Nations representative in Afghanistan lamented in her farewell statement Thursday the harsh edicts that the Taliban have imposed on girls and women since they seized power in the country, denying them the right to education and work and forcing millions to stay at home. – Associated Press 

The Taliban‘s religious police have put up posters across the southern Afghan city of Kandahar saying that Muslim women who do not wear an Islamic hijab that fully covers their bodies are “trying to look like animals”, an official confirmed on Thursday. – Agence France-Presse 

Since the Taliban took over Kabul in August 2021, girls have largely been banned from going to secondary school. The campus of Afghanistan’s American university was closed and its students were left uncertain of their future. […] Of the 110 Afghan students that travelled to Sulaimaniya to complete their studies, 32 graduated in the beginning of June, including Mohammadi and Sahak. – Reuters 

Afghans are struggling to make ends meet amid an economic crisis that has disrupted basic services, left them with rising costs and dim employment prospects, and battered the health and financial sectors. But the country’s Taliban leaders, limited to domestic revenue to fund its first annual budget, have found ways to squeeze citizens even more. – Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty 

Israel

Israel secretly coordinates with the U.S. on many of the airstrikes it carries out in Syria as the allies face a battlefield crowded with militant groups, Iranian-backed militias and foreign militaries, according to current and former U.S. officials. – Wall Street Journal 

Israeli forces shot dead three Palestinians and wounded eight others early Friday during a military operation in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. – Associated Press 

Israel has canceled educational trips to Poland for thousands of high school students this summer, claiming the Polish government is trying to control the Holocaust-studies curriculum taught to Israeli children, the Israeli foreign minister said. – Associated Press 

The Israeli Embassy in Argentina on Thursday confirmed that a member of the IRGC Quds Force had been found among the passengers on an Iranian Mahan Air cargo plane on Sunday. The Iranian plane had been leased to a Venezuelan state-owned airline and was en route from Mexico when it landed in Argentina. – Jerusalem Post 

The US on Thursday called on Israel to release the findings of an internal police investigation into violence at the funeral of slain Al Jazeera TV journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, an American citizen. – Times of Israel 

The Israel Defense Forces said troops arrested four suspects carrying two firearms in the West Bank seam zone, close to the Arab Israeli city of Umm al-Fahm, on Thursday afternoon. – Times of Israel 

More than a year after the Israel Defense Forces fought an 11-day war against terrorists in the Gaza Strip, military officials on Thursday touted new defensive measures as key to maintaining one of the quietest periods in southern Israel in recent years, but warned that the Hamas terror group is working to circumvent them in a potential surprise attack. – Times of Israel 

Mark Regev writes: Perhaps herein lies one reason for the current good relationship: Britannia no longer rules the waves, and Israel is far from the poor and struggling newly independent state it once was, even surpassing the UK in various fields – including in GDP per capita. So as Britain celebrates the platinum jubilee, both countries meet as relative coequals, and a genuine partnership can flourish. – Jerusalem Post 

Shira Efron and Ghaith al-Omari write: The decision by the Biden administration to de-prioritize the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is understandable—even wise—given the political realities in Israel and among the Palestinians. But doing away with a U.S. initiative that has successfully contributed to maintaining stability and, in doing so, has prevented escalation that would have otherwise drawn the United States back into the conflict is—to say the least—ill-advised and self-defeating. – Washington Institute 

China

Beijing launched a new-generation aircraft carrier Friday, the first such ship to be both designed and built in China, in a milestone as it seeks to extend the range and power of its navy. The Type 003 carrier christened Fujian left its drydock at a shipyard outside Shanghai in the morning and tied up at a nearby pier, state media reports said. – Associated Press 

Organizers of November’s soccer World Cup in Qatar appeared to give in to outrage from Taiwan officials and altered a ticketing system that had identified Taiwanese attendees as hailing from China. – Bloomberg 

President Joe Biden will launch a global infrastructure initiative to counter China’s international ambitions, particularly in the Indo-Pacific, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said Thursday. – Bloomberg 

Josh Rogin writes: Meeting military escalation with escalation brings real risks that must be managed, not ignored. But the costs of war if China concludes it can take Taiwan easily would be exponentially higher. The United States doesn’t have the luxury of waiting until the next decade to counter China’s military expansion in Asia. As George Washington said in his first speech to Congress in 1790, “To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.” – Washington Post 

James M. Dorsey writes: Turkey is one state where the issue of the Uighurs in China is not simply a far-from-my-bed show. Uighurs play into domestic politics in a country home to the largest Uighur exile community that has long supported the rights of its Turkic brethren in China and still boasts strong strands of pan-Turkism. These are all elements that could come to the fore when Turkey goes to the polls next year as it celebrates the 100th anniversary of the birth of the Turkish republic. The question is not whether China will encounter choppy waters in the Middle East but when and where. – Middle East Institute 

Zongyuan Zoe Liu writes: While the Biden administration should seek to challenge and coexist with China by the “invest, align, compete” strategy, it should also resist the temptation of either overestimating China’s capacity and demonizing Beijing or naively dismissing China’s potential to challenge U.S. global leadership and the dollar’s dominance. Washington can marginalize China’s attempt to neutralize U.S. geoeconomic power by strengthening the attractiveness of U.S. leadership and the appeal of the existing global system. – Foreign Policy 

Asia

Myanmar’s military junta has doubled down on threats to carry out its first executions since seizing power, defying repeated appeals from the international community and outraging pro-democracy activists who have spent more than a year under siege. – Washington Post 

The election has exposed old wounds. But it has also revealed fresh frustrations with liberal democracy in the Philippines, a close U.S. military ally that has drifted toward China under outgoing president and strongman Rodrigo Duterte. – Washington Post 

South Korea’s President Yoon Suk-yeol said the United Nations Security Council should respond in a coordinated manner against North Korea’s missile provocations, South Korea’s Newsis reported on Friday. – Reuters 

As the military conflict in Ukraine bogs down on a slice of the embattled nation’s eastern and southern periphery, the geopolitical shift sparked by Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion keeps gaining new ground. This week, it emerged that the leaders of Japan and South Korea will attend a NATO summit, as observers, for the first time. It’s another sign of Western-style democracies teaming up to meet the bellicose challenge of Moscow and the growing global assertiveness of Beijing. – TIME

Pacific security issues should and can be dealt with by countries in the region, Samoan Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata’afa said on Friday, adding that China remained an attractive economic partner given its size. – Reuters 

Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong met with the Solomon Islands leader Manasseh Sogavare on Friday, the first visit to Honiara by the new Australian government amid concern over its Pacific neighbour’s security pact with China. – Reuters 

A duo of U.S. senators introduced a bill on Thursday to significantly enhance support for Taiwan, including provisions for billions of dollars in U.S. security assistance and changes to the decades old law undergirding Washington’s unofficial ties with the Chinese-claimed democratic island. – Reuters  

Australia’s new Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Friday he would take advice on whether to accept President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s invitation to visit Ukraine during an upcoming European trip. – Associated Press 

Australia’s new foreign minister on Thursday made New Zealand the first stop on her third Pacific trip in a month as Canberra steps up efforts to counter China’s growing influence in the region. – Associated Press 

Africa

The massacre in Seytenga underscored the increasingly perilous security situation in Burkina Faso, where military leaders ousted the president in a coup in January. At the time, officers promised to restore peace to the country, where militants linked to the Islamic State and al-Qaeda have killed thousands and displaced more than 1.5 million. – Washington Post 

Decades-old tensions between Rwanda, which has one of Africa’s most effective militaries, and Congo, one of the continent’s largest and most troubled countries, have spiked along their shared border a few hours’ drive from Rwanda’s capital, Kigali. Alarm has reached the point where Kenya’s president is urging the immediate deployment of a newly created regional force to eastern Congo to keep the peace. – Associated Press 

The summit is an opportunity to highlight Rwanda’s stability and relative prosperity under Kagame’s rule. It also will focus attention on Rwanda’s widely criticized deal with Britain to deport asylum-seekers from the U.K. to Rwanda. Legal challenges stopped a flight that would have brought the first group just days before the summit. – Associated Press 

Uganda’s military said on Thursday it had discovered bomb making material at a training facility for an Islamic State-allied rebel group around 60 kilometres west of the capital Kampala, and that three people had been detained. – Reuters 

Cybersecurity

Law enforcement in the United States, Germany, the Netherlands and Britain dismantled a global network of internet-connected devices that had been hacked by Russian cyber criminals and used for malicious purposes, the U.S. Justice Department said on Thursday. – Reuters 

A top Ukrainian cybersecurity official said this week that the Russian campaign to wrest control over internet and phone networks in occupied Ukraine continues to grow, even as Russian forces intensify their shelling of telecommunications infrastructure. – CyberScoop 

Farhad Manjoo writes: For millions of people, crypto, like real estate and dot-coms before it, offered a way out of what has otherwise been a dead-end economy. They were simply trying to get ahead in just about the only way one can these days: Put your money into something hot and hope it goes big. It’s the American way. – New York Times 

Maria Bustillos writes: To many, the possibility of huge profits is the most interesting thing about crypto — it’s a gold rush in which anyone can suddenly become rich beyond his or her dreams. But the regrettable get-rich-quick mentality that has too long been associated with entrepreneurship, in crypto and elsewhere, must come to an end. – New York Times 

James Andrew Lewis writes: Ukraine was not the first cyber war nor was cyberattack particularly useful to the Russians. The Ukrainian defenders and their partners did a good job of reacting quickly to deflect Russian efforts to disrupt networks. They do not appear to have faced a well-thought-out plan of attack integrated into broader campaign planning. This may be the most important lesson for cyber warfare from Ukraine: preparation and planning on how to integrate cyber operations with other modes of attack to achieve maximum effect makes cyberattacks useful. – Center for Strategic and International Studies 

Long War

UN-backed court sentenced two Hezbollah members in their absence to life imprisonment on Thursday for a huge Beirut bombing in 2005 that killed Lebanon’s ex-premier Rafic Hariri. Habib Merhi and Hussein Oneissi were found guilty on appeal in March by the Dutch-based Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) over the attack, which killed 21 other people and injured 226. – Agence France-Presse 

The Philippine government has designated a former peace negotiator and five other suspected communist rebel leaders as “terrorists” in a move that allowed the freezing of their financial assets, which officials said could be used to finance attacks. – Associated Press 

French drone strikes killed nearly 40 Islamic extremists earlier this week who were traveling on motorcycles near Niger’s border with Burkina Faso, France’s military announced Thursday. In a statement, the French military called the strikes a “new tactical success” for France’s counterterrorism efforts in Africa’s Sahel region, named Operation Barkhane. – Associated Press