Official reports by the Ukrainian military say that border guards fought courageously and defiantly while defending a strategic island in the Black Sea as they faced a combined missile and artillery strike from invading Russian forces.
The Danube River estuary of Snake Island, also known as Serpent Island, was taken by Russian naval forces and at least 13 Ukrainian border guards were killed defending it, said Interior Minister adviser Anton Herashchenko on Facebook.
One border guard is seen on Twitter responding to a Russian warship’s message to surrender by saying, “go to hell.”
The closest NATO member country to the island is Romania’s coastal city of Sulina, located just 44 kilometers (27 miles) away.
This would enable Russia to place long-range missiles and other military installations in the Danube River delta area closer to the 30-member NATO defense alliance.
One of Russia’s main security demands, issued to the United States and NATO since December, was for the alliance to cease all cooperation with Ukraine and pull its forces back from other eastern European countries.
Moscow has quickly advanced in its aim to militarily subjugate Ukraine in a multi-pronged invasion that Russian President Vladimir declared before dawn on Feb. 24 to destroy Kyiv’s military capability and, as Putin said, “denazify” its neighbor.
Ukraine’s second war-time president since independence, Volodymyr Zelensky, is a non-practicing Jew. Volodymyr Hroisman, Ukraine’s former prime minister in 2016-2019 is also Jewish, as are a number of national lawmakers in the Verkhovna Rada, the Ukrainian Parliament.
