Ukraine’s escalating efforts to target President Vladimir Putin’s oil industry are making significant ripples across Russia. The country, known as one of the largest global energy powerhouses, now faces a dilemma with reduced diesel exports and a need to import fuel. This has resulted in fuel shortages that stretch from Crimea, currently under Russian occupation, to inner cities across the nation.

Within Russia, the impact is increasingly tangible. Former opposition politician and commentator Maxim Katz noted that many Russians are now confronting the direct effects of the ongoing conflict, possibly for the first time. These shortages could become a particularly sensitive issue as the nation heads towards State Duma elections slated for September.

“This marks the first instance where Russians are experiencing the tangible effects of the war in their everyday lives—not just through rising fuel costs, but through its scarcity,” Katz mentioned in an interview conducted over Zoom from Israel, where he currently resides in exile. “The inability to purchase fuel is a significant issue for Russia,” he emphasized.

Katz further explained that while elections in Russia may not be genuinely free or competitive, they still play a crucial role for Putin. They serve to demonstrate public support to regional governors, business leaders, and other influential figures within the elite.

“If everybody sees in September that he has 20% support or 10% support, then questions begin about why he should appoint governors or control the system,” Katz said. “That is something he does not want to deal with.”

The fuel crisis, Katz argued, threatens Putin’s effort to portray himself as fully in control and to keep the cost of the war away from ordinary Russians.

“Putin tried to convince everybody that Moscow would continue to live its regular life and nobody would see the war,” Katz said. “It was his war, not the war of ordinary Russians. But when the war comes home, this is a completely different story, and it changes the equation.”

Katz also pointed to the striking reversal of Russia — historically one of the world’s largest exporters of oil and refined products — seeking fuel supplies from abroad. Reuters reported that Moscow had approached Kazakhstan about importing approximately 50,000 metric tons of gasoline after refinery outages reduced Russian gasoline output by roughly 25% from a year earlier.

The campaign reached a new milestone this week when Ukrainian drones struck the Omsk refinery, Russia’s largest, roughly 1,700 miles from Ukrainian-held territory. The facility temporarily halted processing after the attack, according to Reuters. Days later, another strike shut Russia’s Saratov refinery for the third time this year.

The expanding crisis raises a central question for Ukraine and its allies: Can attacks on the infrastructure that powers Russia’s military and economy alter President Vladimir Putin’s calculations — or will the Kremlin continue shielding its war effort while shifting the burden onto ordinary Russians?

“They have to buy fuel from Kazakhstan now,” Katz said. “Russia is one of the biggest exporters of oil and oil products and always has been. This is crazy.”

Still, Katz cautioned that the Kremlin would likely continue prioritizing military supplies even as civilian shortages worsened.

“He will find the fuel for the tanks. That is not the issue,” Katz said. “The issue is his grip on Russia.”

Retired U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip M. Breedlove, former commander of U.S. European Command and NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe, said the effects are already becoming significant.

“Without question, Ukraine’s campaign against Russia’s oil and energy infrastructure is having a real and growing impact on the Russian homeland,” Breedlove told News Media. “The reported reductions in fuel production are significant — close to a third by some estimates.”

“These strikes are beginning to seriously impact not just the economy but the Kremlin’s ability to sustain its war effort and military operations,” he added. “When Ukraine is able to hit large, high-value energy targets deep inside Russian territory, that changes the equation.”

“Russia cannot effectively defend every refinery and energy facility across their enormous territory, and that is the core problem for Moscow,” Breedlove said. “Every asset they deploy to defend their infrastructure are assets not deployed to the frontlines.”

Moscow has already taken emergency measures. Russia banned diesel exports through the end of July as drone attacks forced unplanned refinery shutdowns and reduced domestic supplies. Seaborne exports of diesel and gasoline fell 39% in June compared with May and 46% from the previous year, according to Reuters.

Ukraine’s ambassador to Israel, Yevgen Korniychuk, said American intelligence has played an important role in helping Kyiv penetrate Russia’s extensive air-defense network.

“You always have to give credit to the United States,” Korniychuk told News Media. “U.S. intelligence is helping Ukrainian missiles and drones avoid Russian anti-missile defense.”

The Wall Street Journal, citing U.S. officials, said in a 2025 report that “The U.S. will provide Ukraine with intelligence for long-range missile strikes on Russia’s energy infrastructure.” Reuters, citing the Financial Times, also reported that “U.S. intelligence has helped Kyiv strike important Russian energy assets, including oil refineries, far beyond the front line, the newspaper said, citing unnamed Ukrainian and U.S. officials familiar with the campaign.”

News Media reached out to the State Department and the White House to confirm the reports and the Ukrainian ambassador’s claims.

Korniychuk said the strikes are creating serious pressure inside the Russian system, even if they have not yet persuaded Putin to change course.

“The majority of the Russian leadership understands that this is a crucial problem, but Putin personally does not,” he said. “The distance between him and the rest of the Russian leadership is growing tremendously. Even people he has trusted for many years understand that this is going nowhere, but that will not necessarily bring Putin to the same conclusion.”

Retired Lt. Gen. Richard Newton, former U.S. Air Force assistant vice chief of staff, argued that the broader strategic picture is shifting in Ukraine’s favor.

“Throughout the conflict, the vast majority of the Russian homeland has been a sanctuary,” Newton said. “However, over the last several months, Ukrainian drone attacks have reached deep inside Russia — up to 1,500 miles recently.”

Newton said the pressure was arriving as Western support strengthened.

“That is a credit to President Zelenskyy, his military leadership and Ukraine’s defense industrial base,” he said. “And it comes at the right time, with Europe now providing military capabilities and financial resources — and now, with renewed public support from President Trump.”

Yet the strategy has limits. Russia continues to generate billions in energy revenue beyond the reach of Ukrainian drones.

Urgewald, a Germany-based nonprofit environmental and human-rights organization analysis of Kpler cargo data found that the European Union received 114 of the 118 cargoes shipped from Russia’s Yamal LNG project between January and May 2026 — about 97% of the project’s exports. The shipments totaled 8.37 million metric tons and had an estimated value of roughly $5.7 billion.

“Current trends show EU payments for Russian Yamal LNG are on course to reach almost $7 billion in the first half of 2026 alone,” Alexander Kirk, a sanctions campaigner at Urgewald, told News Media. “These dollars support Russia’s war economy and help sustain Moscow’s aggression against Ukraine, including the drone and missile warfare terrorizing Ukrainian cities.”

The figures capture the dual reality confronting Kyiv: Ukraine can damage refineries, disrupt domestic fuel supplies and force Moscow to divert resources, while Russia continues earning substantial revenue from global energy markets.

Amb. Korniychuk said Zelenskyy had given the military 40 days to substantially change the situation.

Katz cautioned that there was no way to predict whether Putin’s system was approaching collapse, but said authoritarian regimes can appear stable until they unravel with extraordinary speed.

He compared that uncertainty to the final months of the Soviet Union.

“Nobody before the August Putsch could even think that in three months from now there would be no Soviet Union,” Katz said. “Systems like this — this is one of their common things — collapse quick.”

For now, Ukraine’s strikes have not halted Russian military operations or forced Putin to negotiate. But they have reached deep into Russia, strained its fuel system and undermined the Kremlin’s effort to keep the war distant from its population.

The question being asked by analystsis no longer whether Ukraine can hit Russia’s economic engine, but how much sustained pressure that engine — and Putin’s political system — can withstand.

In the wake of the haunting third season of The Terror: Devil in Silver, fans might be thrilled to know that whispers of a new chapter in the beloved horror anthology series are already circulating.

David W. Zucker, the show’s producer, has unveiled that the groundwork for Season 4 has begun, with Scott Free Productions securing the rights to another book they are eager to bring to the screen.

In a conversation with ScreenRant, Zucker was questioned about whether the recent season marked the conclusion of a trilogy. His response hinted that the creative minds behind the series are already planning the next step.

“We just closed the deal on the book we’re gonna develop next,” Zucker confirmed.

While this is not an official renewal from AMC, and numerous challenges remain before a fourth season is confirmed, Zucker’s update reveals that early preparations are in motion. Enthusiasts of the show should stay tuned for more developments as this potential new season progresses.

Fans also shouldn’t expect the process to move overnight. The series has never operated on a traditional television schedule, with seven years separating Seasons 2 and 3 after development was slowed by the COVID-19 pandemic and the dual Hollywood strikes in 2023.

The anthology first debuted on AMC in 2018 with an adaptation of Dan Simmons’ novel The Terror. That season followed two British Royal Navy ships that became trapped in Arctic ice while searching for the Northwest Passage, only to find themselves hunted by a terrifying supernatural force.

Season 2, The Terror: Infamy, shifted the setting to a Japanese American internment camp during World War II, where an evil spirit preyed on those imprisoned there. The latest installment, The Terror: Devil in Silver, adapted Victor LaValle’s novel of the same name and brought the franchise into the present day with a psychological horror story set inside a psychiatric hospital hiding dark secrets.

Despite the lengthy hiatus between installments, the anthology hasn’t lost its critical edge. Devil in Silver currently holds a 95% critics score on Rotten Tomatoes, continuing the series’ reputation as one of television’s strongest horror anthologies.

Exactly how many people tuned in, however, remains a mystery. AMC hasn’t released viewership numbers for the latest season, which premiered on AMC+ and Shudder rather than airing on AMC’s linear network. Depending on how a potential fourth season comes together—and who ultimately signs on creatively—it isn’t out of the question that the anthology could return to a more traditional release strategy.

For now, though, fans have reason to be optimistic. While an official renewal hasn’t arrived, Scott Free Productions is already searching for The Terror‘s next nightmare.

A tragic accident claimed the lives of an Oklahoma father and son as their plane went down on their return journey from a St. Louis Cardinals game, due to adverse weather conditions.

Jimmy Don Lewis, 48, and his 22-year-old son, Brayden Ty Lewis, were discovered deceased amidst the debris of their Beechcraft Baron 55 by emergency teams Friday morning.

Reports indicate that the aircraft likely crashed just before 11 p.m. on Thursday night near Waterloo, Illinois, according to information from KSDK.

Despite the late-night crash, rescue operations weren’t initiated until around 2:30 p.m. the following day, prompted by reports of a potential plane crash, as confirmed by the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department.

Authorities, collaborating with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), worked diligently to pinpoint the search area and track the last known position of the aircraft.

Aerial search efforts were thwarted due to bad weather, not allowing crews to ‘safely conduct’ operations. 

‘The Illinois State Police aircraft responded and conducted an aerial search utilizing thermal imaging technology; however, the weather conditions and cloud cover prevented crews from locating the aircraft,’ the sheriff’s department said. 

Around 6am, the Waterloo Fire Command activated a drone search. Two hours later, the aircraft was located in a tree line near a rural field and the two men were confirmed to have died. 

Police believe the pair ran into bad weather on their way home to West Siloam Springs, near the Oklahoma-Arkansas border, after the Cardinals game. 

Flight data suggested the pair had tried to turn the aircraft in a possible ‘attempt to avoid the storm, before entering what appeared to be a descending spiral,’ the sheriff’s department said. 

‘Radar contact was subsequently lost.’ 

The crash remains under investigation by the FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board. 

The Lewis family appeared to be an all-American family who loved to travel and recently welcomed a grandbaby. 

Lewis’ fit wife, Jill, posted photos from several of the family’s trips, including a romantic European trip with her husband, where the pair visited Rome and Venice, Italy, among other cities, in May 2024. 

The family, who lives in a $1 million home, also loved to take ski trips together to Winter Park in Colorado. 

Brayden, who went by Ty, recently took a trip to Spain, France, and Italy with his girlfriend Payton, as well as a boys’ trip to Mexico. 

Brayden’s social media showed the young man loved football, having played in high school, and enjoyed bull riding as a child. 

He also enjoyed riding his motorcycle and working out, his social media showed. 

His sister, Kelsey, who welcomed a new baby a few months ago, posted her grief on Facebook, alongside a photo of herself, her father, brother, and husband in the private plane together from an unknown date. 

‘Dad insisted on taking a picture he said: “Take a picture of all of us have to have them for memories,” and anyone who knows dad, he didn’t like pictures of himself, and I already know Ty was thinking: “Really a picture without my hat?” 

‘I love you both.’ 

Payton also posted a tribute on Instagram, writing ‘I will always love you. Till we meet again, my love.’  

The Daily Mail has reached out to friends and family for comment.  

A breakthrough in DNA technology has led to the arrest of a North Carolina man for the 1988 murder of a woman in Orlando, Florida. Tremendous advancements in forensic science have finally brought a suspect into the spotlight nearly four decades after the case turned cold, according to police reports.

On Thursday, the Orlando Police Department revealed that Willie J. Carpenter was captured by the U.S. Marshals Service’s North Carolina Regional Task Force. He is now facing charges of first-degree murder in connection with the demise of Diane Matthews.

Diane Matthews’ body was discovered on September 8, 1988, at the Orlando answering service facility where she was employed, located in the city’s downtown area.

Authorities stated that Matthews’ facial injuries were so extensive that her identity was initially unknown; a colleague later recognized her solely by her hair.

Detectives collected fingerprints and biological evidence from the crime scene and conducted numerous witness interviews, but DNA technology was not routinely used in criminal investigations at the time.

Although investigators preserved the evidence and continued pursuing leads, no suspect was identified, and the case eventually went cold.

The investigation took a significant turn more than two decades later when Carpenter’s DNA was entered into the Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, following an unrelated arrest on charges related to a sexual offense in North Carolina with an underage female, police said.

Investigators identified Carpenter’s DNA as a potential match to biological evidence collected during the Matthews homicide investigation.

Detectives interviewed Carpenter in 2013, but he denied knowing Matthews and declined to provide a DNA sample.

When investigators interviewed Carpenter again in 2024, he voluntarily provided a DNA sample.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement conducted additional testing on the sample, producing results in 2025 that further strengthened the evidentiary link between Carpenter and biological evidence recovered from the crime scene, police said.

Detectives then spent months reviewing the evidence, consulting with prosecutors and eliminating other potential suspects before seeking an arrest warrant this year.

Carpenter was taken into custody without incident and remains in North Carolina pending extradition to Florida.

News Media has reached out to the Orlando Police Department for additional information, including court records and details surrounding the investigation.

The country’s affection for Dairy Queen’s Blizzard seems to have cooled significantly.

Since the onset of 2025, Dairy Queen has faced a series of franchise closures, resulting in at least 46 store shutdowns across the United States. Texas has been hit the hardest due to the franchise operator, Project Lonestar, declining to modernize locations, which ultimately led to their removal from the Dairy Queen network. A staggering 42 outlets were shuttered in Texas within February and March, leaving ice cream fans searching for alternatives. (Perhaps it’s time for them to give McFlurry a shot.)

In the state of Alaska, DQ lovers faced disappointment as branches in Anchorage, Wasilla, and Palmer all closed at the beginning of July. As reported by the Anchorage Daily News, this leaves only one Dairy Queen in the entire state, situated in Soldotna—a quaint city home to about 4,332 people and brimming with wildlife such as bears, moose, caribou, and wild sheep across 200 acres of protected land.

Similarly, in Great Falls, Montana, a Dairy Queen with a history spanning 39 years decided to close its doors on June 13. There’s little point lamenting over this loss, as owner Steve Galloway is transitioning into the fast-casual Mediterranean dining arena.

These closures coincide with a broader trend as Americans encounter higher costs at drive-thrus nationwide. Federal statistics reveal a 3.5% increase in the price of dining out over the past year, prompting many budget-minded individuals to reconsider their indulgences like the Peanut Buster Parfait.

Considered one of the pioneers of soft serve ice cream, Dairy Queen was founded in 1940 in Illinois before getting acquired by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway in 1998. Today, it boasts roughly 7,800 locations in over 20 countries. And though the mainland is losing some Blizzard hotspots, the chain is reportedly plotting an expansion into Puerto Rico with 20 new “Grill & Chill” spots in the tropical U.S. territory.

To coax customers into its ice cream palace, Dairy Queen has made new Blizzard flavors like strawberry-mango mochi and Mexican hot chocolate. There have also been co-branded lip balms and pajamas featuring its breakfast line, plus a new partnership with the exhibition baseball team The Savannah Bananas, “bringing flips, fun and free shakes” to various ballparks. On social media, DQ is often heart-ed because of its “pup cups,” an off-menu frozen dog treat that’s usually free with purchase.

For those who still have a DQ in their midst, free Dilly Bars (vanilla ice cream surrounded by a frozen chocolate shell) are available for DQ Rewards members from July 13-19. The promotion marks National Ice Cream Day on July 19.

Alas, for Alaskans, the Blizzard warning still stands.