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The US Department of Defense (DoD) announced on July 29 the provision of security assistance to Ukraine worth $200 million from the authorization of a Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) package and an additional package worth $1.5 billion in Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI) funds.
Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to use nuclear saber-rattling to target Western decision-making and promote Western self-deterrence.
Hezbollah likely conducted the July 27 rocket attack that killed 12 Israeli children in Majdal Shams, Golan Heights.
The IDF assessed that Lebanese Hezbollah conducted a rocket attack that killed at least ten Israeli children and “youths” and wounded 30 other Israeli civilians in Majdal Shams, Golan Heights, on July 27. The IDF assessed that Hezbollah conducted the attack using at least 40 projectiles in three separate barrages. Hezbollah denied responsibility for the attack. The rockets struck a soccer field in Majdal Shams, which is a Druze village in the Golan Heights. Israeli media reported that many the wounded civilians are children. Israeli media reported that this attack caused the most civilian casualties in northern Israel since October 2023.
Ukrainian forces reportedly conducted successful drone strikes against an oil refinery and Russian military airfields in Saratov, Ryazan, and Murmansk oblasts on the night of July 26 to 27. Sources with Ukrainian special services told Ukrainian media that Ukraine's Main Military Intelligence Directorate (GUR) struck Russian military airfields in Engles, Saratov Oblast; the Dyaghilev Airfield and an oil refinery in Ryazan Oblast; and the Olenya Airfield in Murmansk Oblast with drones. Suspilne's sources reported that Russian forces base an unspecified number of Tu-95, Tu-22, Tu-134, and Il-78 (tanker) aircraft at the Dyaghilev Airfield and that the GUR drones damaged a TU-22M3 strategic bomber at the Olenya Airfield.
A new Iranian-backed Iraqi militia claimed two rocket attacks targeting US forces in Iraq and Syria on July 25.
The Russian military has recently expanded the Russian Central Grouping of Forces' area of responsibility in Donetsk Oblast, suggesting that the Russian military command has deprioritized the grouping's previous task to act solely as an operational maneuver force in the Avdiivka direction.
US, Israeli, and Arab officials are reportedly considering former Fatah leader Mohammad Dahlan as an interim leader of Palestinian security forces in the post-war Gaza Strip. Dahlan is a former Fatah official who was a close advisor to former Palestinian Authority (PA) leader Yasser Arafat. The Wall Street Journal reported on July 25 that under the plan, Dahlan would oversee an interim security force of 2,500 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip after Israeli troops withdraw, citing Arab officials. The United States, Israel, and Egypt would vet the Palestinian personnel, who would work in coordination with unspecified international forces and even private Western security firms.
The CCG continued to expand its “law enforcement activities” to assert the PRC’s claim over the Taiwan Strait. Four CCG ships entered restricted waters in four different locations around Taiwan’s Kinmen island group on July 19. Kinmen is a Taiwanese island chain located just 10 kilometers (6 miles) from the PRC’s coast. Taiwan’s Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said this was the 32nd such incursion into Kinmen’s restricted waters in 2024. On the same day, the CGA also discovered a CCG ship trying to expel Taiwanese fishing boats near the middle of the Taiwan Strait, around 48 miles west of Huayu Island of Taiwan’s Penghu archipelago.
Ukrainian forces blunted one of the largest Russian mechanized assaults in Ukraine since October 2023 in western Donetsk Oblast on July 24. Geolocated footage published on July 24 shows that Ukrainian forces stopped a reinforced battalion size Russian mechanized assault near Kostyantynivka (southwest of Donetsk City) after Russian forces advanced up to the southeastern outskirts of the settlement. A Ukrainian brigade operating in the Kurakhove direction reported that Russian forces attacked simultaneously with 11 tanks, 45 armored combat vehicles, a rare "Terminator" armored fighting vehicle (of which Russia has reportedly manufactured only 23 as of December 2023), 12 motorcycles, and roughly 200 personnel from several tactical directions at dawn on July 24.