Ukraine continues to reel from Russia’s missile strike on Monday, which ranks as the largest attack since the start of the war, as Moscow is beginning to suggest that Ukraine could make desperate moves. 

“Russia’s large-scale strikes on Ukraine’s critical infrastructure on Monday are almost certainly in response to Ukraine’s incursion into Kursk Oblast, breaching Russia’s border,” Rebekah Koffler, told Fox News Digital. 

“Zelenskyy likely anticipated Russia’s retaliation and accepted the risk anyway,” Koffler explained. “Zelenskyy wants to stay in the fight – there’s no other path for him personally or professionally.”

“To stay in the fight, he needs more weapons and financing from the West,” she added. “Zelenskyy likely seeks from the Biden Administration the removal of restrictions for the employment of U.S.-provided weapons, so Ukrainian forces can strike targets deeper inside Russia that are currently within range.” 

ON UKRAINIAN INDEPENDENCE DAY, OVER 100 POWS SWAPPED WITH RUSSIA

On Monday, Russia launched 100 missiles and 100 drones as Ukraine continued its incursion into the Kursk region, which marked the first land invasion of Russia since World War II and the most significant setback for Russian President Vladimir Putin since his troops invaded Ukraine. The strikes knocked out key energy infrastructure in 15 regions across the country, killed five people and injured many others, French outlet Le Monde reported. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed on his Telegram channel that Western allies had effectively hamstrung Ukraine with restrictions on weapon use, arguing that “We could do much more to protect lives if the air forces of our European neighbors worked together with our F-16 [fighters] and anti-aircraft defenses.”

Russia followed up that massive strike with a second volley overnight Monday, which killed at least two people as missiles and drones rained down across the Zaporizhzhia region in the southeast, the BBC reported. Ukraine used newly-deployed F16s to help shoot down five missiles and 60 drones, limiting the second strike’s impact to a couple dozen projectiles overall.  

President Biden blasted Russia for the “outrageous” attacks and promised to support Ukraine’s energy grid. British Foreign Secretary David Lammy ridiculed Russia for “cowardly missile and drone attacks on civilian infrastructure.” 

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Ukraine has started compiling a list of long-range targets to hit should Western allies agree to Zelenskyy’s request and lift restrictions on defensive strike capabilities. 

This photograph shows damaged houses on a site following an air attack in the Odesa region of Ukraine on Aug. 26, 2024, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (Oleksandr Gimanov/AFP via Getty Images)

The Kursk invasion, which continues to take Moscow by surprise, aimed to divert attention away from other areas – specifically the Pokrovsk and Kurakhove sectors, according to Reuters. 

Ukrainian General Oleksandr Syrskyi in remarks broadcast on television argued that Russia had tried to disrupt Ukraine’s supply lines going into those two areas, but that following the Kursk invasion, Moscow had to redeploy around 30,000 servicemen to the Kursk front “and this figure is growing.” 

Ukrainian forces fight during military operations in Kursk region in Malaya Loknya, Kursk Region, Russia in this screen grab obtained from a handout video released on Aug. 20, 2024. (95th Air Assault Brigade/Handout via REUTERS)

Syrskyi also reported that Ukraine had captured 594 Russian servicemen during the Kursk operation along with 100 settlements, and he claimed that Ukraine had rebuffed Russia’s efforts to counterattack their push.

RUSSIA LOOKS TO DOWNPLAY UKRAINE INVASION AS ‘NEW NORMAL’ WHILE PUTIN FAILS TO STOP WAR ON HOME TURF: REPORT

Koffler advised, however, that as significant as Ukraine’s effort has proven, it remains a double-edged sword that could end up hurting Kyiv in the long-run, with Russia looking to calibrate attacks to keep them “below the threshold of U.S./NATO deploying forces into the theater.”

“While Kyiv was trying to stretch the Russian forces, it stretched its own also,” Koffler explained. “And the manpower ratio overwhelmingly favors Russia and in the war of attrition.”

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy, right, greets Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi during an official meeting on Aug. 23, 2024 in Kyiv, Ukraine. (Yan Dobronosov/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images)

“Putin, on the other hand, seeks to deter Ukraine from future strikes on Russia and to compel the West to stop assisting Kyiv,” she suggested. “His objective is not a decisive military victory but the degradation of Ukraine’s defensive and industrial capacity, to make it useless for NATO and the West.”

“Putin would rather end this war sooner rather than later, but only on his terms,” she said. “The key question now is whether the Biden-Harris Administration will change policy, allowing Ukraine to be more aggressive in eroding Russia’s red lines.”

Peace efforts continue to prove distant, but various world leaders have tried their hand at seeking a deal between Russia and Ukraine to bring the conflict to a close: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, in his first week as the rotating chair of the European Union, immediately visited both Zelenskyy and Putin to seek a path forward for peace.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the past week took a run at finding a peace deal, visiting Zelenskyy over the weekend before speaking with President Biden on Monday and with Putin on Tuesday.

Modi, who reached Kyiv via train from Poland, stressed to Zelenskyy that “both sides will have to sit together and to look for ways to come out of this crisis,” the BBC reported. Zelenskyy had expressed displeasure two months ago when Modi was photographed embracing Putin during a face-to-face meeting. 

Modi circled back to Putin after both Ukraine and U.S. talks, speaking with his Russian counterpart over the phone on Tuesday. A readout of the call did not mention what the two leaders discussed. 

Fox News Digital’s Caitlin McFall and Reuters contributed to this report. 

LONDON (AP) — Oasis, the Britpop band known for timeless hits like “Wonderwall” and “Don’t Look Back in Anger,” is reuniting for a tour of the British Isles next summer, ending a 15-year hiatus and, presumably, the long-held feud between brothers Liam and Noel Gallagher.

The guitar band will play 14 dates in Wales, England, Scotland and Ireland next July and August, Oasis said on Tuesday. Tickets go on sale at 9 a.m. Saturday.

“This is it. This is happening,″ the band said.

Oasis split in 2009 after many years of infighting, with Noel Gallagher officially leaving the band just before a performance at a festival near Paris. Even before the dissolution, the brothers had long had an antagonistic relationship and reportedly did not speak to each other for years after the breakup.

“People will write and say what they like, but I simply could not go on working with Liam a day longer,” Noel Gallagher, the band’s guitarist and songwriter, wrote in a statement at the time.

While the Gallagher brothers haven’t performed together since, both regularly perform Oasis songs at their solo gigs. They’ve also each fired off criticisms of the other in the press.

Noel Gallagher accused his younger brother of having a hangover that forced them to cancel a 2009 concert. The frontman disputed the accusation and sued, later dropping the lawsuit.

But now the brothers are preparing to reunite, with the band saying fans would experience “the spark and intensity” that occurs only when they appear on stage together.

The tour will begin July 4 and 5 at Principality Stadium in Cardiff, Wales. Oasis will also perform at Heaton Park in Manchester, England, on July 11, 12, 19 and 20; Wembley Stadium in London on July 25 and 26 and Aug. 2 and 3; Scottish Gas Murrayfield Stadium in Edinburgh on Aug. 8 and 9; and Croke Park in Dublin on Aug. 16 and 17.

The band alluded to past tensions in the tour announcement.

“The guns have fallen silent,” Oasis said. “The stars have aligned. The great wait is over. Come see. It will not be televised.”

In 2011, Noel Gallagher told The Associated Press in an interview that he left the band after an incident where Liam Gallagher started wielding a guitar “like an axe … and he’s swinging this guitar around and he kind of you know, he took my face off with it, you know?”

In 2019, Liam Gallagher told the AP he was ready to reconcile.

“The most important thing is about me and him being brothers,” he said. “He thinks I’m desperate to get the band back together for money. But I didn’t join the band to make money. I joined the band to have fun and to see the world.”

“I don’t know what his problem is,” he continued. “I think he just wanted to go away and do his solo career, get all the coin and be surrounded by all the yes men you can fire and hire whenever he wants. You can’t do that with me.”

With the announcement, the Britpop progenitors ended a few days of fan speculation. A short video on the band’s social media accounts Sunday night had revealed the date “27.08.24,” and time “8 a.m.,” written in the same font as the well-known Oasis logo. The brothers shared the same to their individual accounts.

Of course, fans have long theorized a reunion might be on the horizon: In the wake of the 2017 bombing that killed 22 at an Ariana Grande concert in Oasis’ hometown of Manchester, Liam Gallagher performed at a benefit concert that fueled speculation of a reunion. He criticized his brother’s absence, but a spokesperson said Noel Gallagher couldn’t attend because of a longstanding family trip. Benefit organizers said Noel Gallagher approved the use of Oasis’ music and donated royalties from “Don’t Look Back In Anger” to the British Red Cross’ One Love Manchester fund.

Later that year, Liam Gallagher tweeted at his brother, leading some to believe they made up: “I wanna say Happy Xmas to team NG it’s been a great year thanks for everything looking forward to seeing you tomorrow AS YOU WERE LG x”

Prior to Tuesday’s announcement, Oasis was already teed up to release a new collection, “Definitely Maybe – Deluxe 30th Anniversary Editions,” celebrating the anniversary of their debut album.

Rumors of a potential reunion were amplified this past weekend when Liam Gallagher responded on social media to unconfirmed reports of the band playing London’s Wembley Stadium and Manchester’s Heaton Park. When one social media user criticized Heaton Park, the Manchester native wrote, “See you down the front,” calling the user a vulgarity. In another stand-alone post on X, he teased, “I never did like that word FORMER.”

“You tell me man,” Liam Gallagher replied. He also responded to several negative tweets about the potential reunion with “Your attitude sucks” and “SHUTUP.” Noel Gallagher, on the other hand, remained silent other than posting the teasers.

___

AP Music Writer Maria Sherman reported from New York.