The Ukrainian civilians woke long before dawn in the bitter cold, lined up for the single toilet and were loaded at gunpoint into the livestock trailer. They spent the next 12 hours or more digging trenches on the front lines for Russian soldiers.
Many were forced to wear overlarge Russian military uniforms that could make them a target, and a former city administrator trudged around in boots five sizes too big. By the end of the day, their hands curled into icy claws.

Israelis launched nationwide protests Tuesday after the latest legislative move on the government's controversial judicial reform package.
Demonstrators took to the streets hours after parliament backed in a first reading a key element of the legal overhaul.

When long-neutral Sweden applied for NATO membership together with Finland, both expected a quick accession process.
More than a year later, Finland is in, but Sweden is still in the alliance's waiting room.

With Russia's war on Ukraine in its 17th month, and Western countries sending increasingly hi-tech and long-range weapons and ammunition to help President Volodymyr Zelensky defend his country, it's easy to lose track of where NATO stands.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg — the top civilian official at the world's biggest security alliance — routinely praises allies for helping Ukraine's troops to fight back. But when he does, Stoltenberg is talking about individual member countries, not NATO as an organization.

Nearly 50,000 Russian men have died in the war in Ukraine, according to the first independent statistical analysis of Russia's war dead.
Two independent Russian media outlets, Mediazona and Meduza, working with a data scientist from Germany's Tübingen University, used Russian government data to shed light on one of Moscow's closest-held secrets — the true human cost of its invasion of Ukraine.

Russia's rebellious mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin walked free from prosecution for his June 24 armed mutiny, and it's still unclear if anyone will face any charges in the aborted uprising against military leaders or for the deaths of the soldiers killed in it.
Instead, a campaign is underway to portray the founder of the Wagner Group military contractor as driven by greed, with only hints of an investigation into whether he mishandled any of the billions of dollars in state funds.

A Quran burning and a string of requests to approve protests involving the destruction of more holy books have left Sweden torn between its commitment to free speech and its respect for religious minorities.
The clash of fundamental principles has complicated Sweden's desire to join NATO, an expansion that gained urgency after Russia's invasion of Ukraine but needs the approval of all current members. Turkey has blocked Swedish accession since last year, citing reasons including anti-Turkish and anti-Islamic protests in Stockholm.

Even in normal times Emmanuel Macron needed allies' help governing France.
To get some things done he worked with the traditional right. The center-left helped the French president accomplish others. The challenge was bigger than any a French leader had faced in more than two decades: He had to convince politicians across the country's national assembly to support even a minor domestic project.

Airstrikes targeting Palestinian militants in a crowded residential area. Armored bulldozers plowing through narrow streets, crushing cars and piling up debris. Protesters burning tires. A mounting death toll.
Israel's large-scale military raid into the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank on Monday had undeniable similarities with the second Palestinian uprising of the early 2000s — a period that claimed thousands of lives.

Did mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin have inside help from the military and political elite in his armed rebellion that rattled Russia?
