Russia, Escalating a Thousand-Year-Old Feud, Sets Afire Cathedral at Kyiv in Drone Strike

Hours after President Putin made a one-hour telephone call to President Trump to convey birthday greetings, a Russian drone hit Kyiv’s 975–year-old Monastery of the Caves. Fires burned through the roof of the monastery’s centerpiece Assumption Cathedral, necropolis for Kyivan princes since the 13th century.“This isn’t a coincidence that this attack happened tonight,” a former Voice of America Pentagon correspondent, Ostap Yarysh, posted on X from Washington. “The Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra carries deep significance for Ukrainians. Putin knew Donald Trump would be celebrating his birthday and that U.S. media would be talking about the UFC fight, leaving public attention elsewhere.”From Kyiv, videos of orange flames illuminating the cathedral’s cross-topped golden domes were posted by Metropolitan Epiphanius of Kyiv and All Ukraine, the head of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.“Due to the Russian shelling that is currently taking place, on the night of June 15, the roof of one of the holiest places in the Christian world — the Dormition Cathedral of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra — is burning,” the metropolitan wrote. He is senior abbot of the church, built to celebrate the Virgin Mary’s ascent to heaven after her death.He added: “Another Russian crime against humanity, against history, against Christianity. What more must the Kremlin Antichrist do for the world to realize that decisive action must be taken so that the Russian terror against Ukraine and the very principles of peace comes to an end?”President Trump boards Air Force One, June 15, 2026, at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. AP/Julia Demaree NikhinsonEarlier, President Volodymyr Zelensky also called Mr. Trump to congratulate him on his 80th birthday. The two leaders agreed to discuss paths to a Russia–Ukraine peace accord when the two meet face-to-face tomorrow or Wednesday at the Group of 7 meeting at Évian-les-Bains, a French town on the southern shore of Lake Geneva. After walking under the charred beams of the cathedral this morning, Mr. Zelensky appealed on Telegram to G-7 leaders that their response “be decisive and meaningful: more pressure on the aggressor, more assistance to Ukraine with air defense, primarily with anti-ballistic missiles.” European officials expressed shock today. “This is a Unesco world heritage site, which for us in France is the equivalent of Notre Dame or Saint Denis being bombed,” said the French foreign minister, Jean-Noel Barrot, as he arrived at Évian. The European Union foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, called the attack a “war crime.”Russia’s pre-dawn assault on Ukraine’s capital today involved 611 drones and 70 missiles including six Zircon hypersonic missiles, according to Ukraine’s Air Force. The military says it downed 71 percent of the missiles and 95 percent of the drones. The raid killed five civilians and injured 34, according to early reports. President Trump greets Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, on August 15, 2025. Julia Demaree Nikhinson/APThe attack on one of Ukraine’s holiest sites seems to reflect Mr. Putin’s growing desperation. Designed to be a quick operation, his war on Ukraine now lasts longer than World War I.According to all metrics, his recent spring ground offensive stalled, gaining no ground in southern Ukraine. Russian rates of killed and wounded average 1,000 a day. Despite strict censorship, this appalling casualty rate is getting back to the home front. Even though signing bonuses can reach $80,000, recruitment fell by 20 percent in the first quarter of 2026, German economist Janis Kluge calculates.On the international front, things look worse. If a peace deal between America and Iran is signed this Friday, as announced, the Strait of Hormuz will reopen, oil will flow, and world energy prices will recede to pre-war levels. In an attack on Russia’s sanctions-busting exports, British Royal Marine commandos yesterday, for the first time, intercepted and seized control of a Russian shadow fleet oil tanker sailing in the English Channel, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Sunday.Mr. Putin cultivates Mr. Trump, believing that through White House pressure on Ukraine, Russia can win at the negotiating table what it cannot win on the battlefield. Yesterday, in written greetings to Mr. Trump, the Russian leader enthused: “Dear Donald, I wholeheartedly congratulate you, such a bright, remarkable person and politician, on your 80th birthday!”President Trump greets President Volodymyr Zelensky at Mar-a-Lago, December 28, 2025. AP/Alex BrandonLast year, Mr. Trump cut off almost all military aid to Ukraine. In response, Mr. Zelensky turned on a dime, cultivated Europe, and replaced American aid with European aid and defense production joint ventures. Today, Mr. Trump’s leverage over Ukraine and its army, the largest in Europe, is limited.Ignoring American “signals,” Ukraine sends long-range drones and missiles on a daily basis to bomb Russian oil installations — refineries, depots, and export terminals. As a result Russian crude processing rates are now at a 20-year low, according to Bloomberg calculations. At the politically crucial cities of Moscow and St. Petersburg, more and more gas stations put up signs last weekend limiting gasoline sales to 5 gallons per customer.To fight back, Kremlin bombing strategists seek to find Ukraine’s Achilles’s heel. They have stepped up bombing of Ukraine’s Odessa ports, lifelines for the export of the nation’s top product — grain. Now, they are targeting culture.Yesterday, Russian kamikaze drones started an enormous fire at the Art Museum of Kharkiv, the nation’s second-largest city. While workers and volunteers scrambled to rescue the collection of 25,000 pieces, five firefighters were killed in a ‘double tap’ second strike at a nearby fire. Last month, in a vast attack on Kyiv, drones damaged the National Art Museum, Kyiv Opera Theater, and Dynamo Stadium. They destroyed the Chernobyl Museum. Today, Russian drones damaged in Kyiv the Mystetskyi Arsenal Art Gallery and the National Film Studio, destroying the largest and oldest costume collection in Ukraine.“Russia continues to purposefully attack not only civilian infrastructure and civilians, but also cultural institutions that preserve Ukrainian identity, memory and history,” the culture minister at Kyiv, Tetyana Berezhna, posted this morning on Facebook, noting the film studio housed about 100,000 costumes.This morning, Russia blamed Ukraine for the attack on its own holy site. The Russian defense ministry posted on Telegram: “According to confirmed reports, the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra complex was hit by a missile from an American Patriot anti-aircraft missile system.” Ukraine says the debris of a Russian Geran-2 drone were found this morning on the cathedral roof.Today’s attack on the Monastery of the Caves, or Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, is the latest chapter in Moscow’s 1,000-year-long feud with Ukraine. In 1051, Anthony, a monk from Mount Athos, Greece, chose to bring the monastic tradition to Kyiv, moving into a cave overlooking the Dnipro River. At the time, Moscow was birch forest. Moscow was founded 100 years later.The Kyiv Monastery grew in influence until 1722, when the Russian Tsar, Peter the Great, stepped in, bringing the Ukrainian church under direct control of the Russian Orthodox Church. In 1918, Bolshevik troops invaded the complex and shot to death Metropolitan Vladimir of Kyiv in front of his monks. Soon after, the communists turned Assumption Cathedral into a museum of atheism.In November 1941, retreating Soviet soldiers mined the cathedral. Safely on the east bank of the Dnipro, they waited until a high-level Nazi delegation visited and then blew it up. Knowing of popular veneration for the complex, the Soviet press then blamed the attack on the Germans.After the war, about 100 monks returned. By 1961, though, they all were removed. Only in 1988, at the time of perestroika under Mikhail Gorbachev, did Moscow once again allow religious services.In 2019, Ukraine’s Orthodox Church won internationally recognized independence from Russian control. In February 2022, Mr. Putin’s full-bore assault on Ukraine, triggered a Ukrainian purge of Russian sympathizers living at the monastery. One year ago, Metropolitan Epiphanius conducted the first Ukrainian-language service in many years at the Cathedral. Russia’s state-controlled press objected loudly to these changes.This morning, monks and volunteers struggled to bring ikons and relics out of the burning building. Kyiv’s city military administration head, Tymur Tkachenko, wrote on Telegram: “The Russians are the barbarians of the 21st century. We will remember everything.”

Russia, Escalating a Thousand-Year-Old Feud, Sets Afire Cathedral at Kyiv in Drone Strike

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