Since the Russia-Ukraine war began over 20 months ago, Western media has constructed and dutifully hewn to a series of narratives: Volodymyr Zelensky is a war hero and resistance leader akin to Winston Churchill. Ukrainians are eager to volunteer for the war effort while Russians flee conscription. More money and weapons are all the Ukrainians need to retake the territory Russia has annexed. The West’s interests lie in helping them achieve that grand victory rather than in pushing for a ceasefire and negotiated settlement.
Facts at odds with these narratives — such as that Ukraine has been taking unsustainable losses in combat, that we don’t have enough artillery shells to adequately supply them, that the billions we’ve been sending to Ukraine are falling prey to corruption — have been dismissed as “Putin talking points.” The critics who point them out are attacked as Kremlin apologists.
All of which is why it was so extraordinary to read this week’s cover story in TIME magazine.
Written by Simon Shuster, who previously wrote the article naming Zelensky TIME's“Person of the Year” at the end of 2022, the piece is ostensibly another hagiography of Zelensky as the heroic figure forced to go it alone as times get tough and Western allies start to “abandon” him. But rather than shoring up Zelensky’s standing in the West, it validates many of the criticisms made by those supposed Putin apologists. Only now those criticisms are being voiced by Zelensky’s own aides and advisers inside the presidential palace.
The narrative dam our media has built around the reality in Ukraine is apparently breaking wide open, and the truth is finally spilling out:
Ukraine’s war aims are unrealistic. Kyiv has long maintained that its definition of victory, namely the retaking of all Ukrainian territory including Crimea, is achievable with Western arms and money. Now a disastrous summer counteroffensive, which has resulted in horrific Ukrainian casualties while reclaiming negligible amounts of territory, has Zelensky’s advisers reconsidering whether those aims are realistic. Yet Zelensky’s belief in ultimate victory over Russia has only “hardened into a form that worries some of his advisors,” according to Shuster, who describes Zelensky’s faith as “immovable, verging on the messianic.” One of Zelensky’s closest aides tells Shuster that, “He is delusional. We’re out of options. We’re not winning. But try telling him that.” This of course runs counter to all the propaganda pumped out by Ukraine and repeated by Western media sources. But increasingly it’s only Zelensky who still believes his own press clippings.
Staggering casualties have decimated the Ukrainian army. Ukraine has refused to disclose casualty counts throughout the war, dismissing the increasingly-credible reports of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian casualties as Russian propaganda. But another close aide to Zelensky tells Shuster that casualties are so horrific that “even if the U.S. and its allies come through with all the weapons they have pledged, ‘we don’t have the men to use them.’” Shuster reports that, “In some branches of the military, the shortage of personnel has become even more dire than the deficit in arms and ammunition.” According to the article, the average age of a currently-serving Ukrainian soldier is 43 and getting older all the time. It appears the youth have already been sacrificed.
Conscription policies are draconian. Another fact dismissed as a “Putin talking point” is that Ukrainians have had to resort to ever-more draconian conscription policies to replenish their military’s ranks. Shuster lays out the unpleasant reality: “New recruitment is way down. As conscription efforts have intensified across the country, stories are spreading on social media of draft officers pulling men off trains and buses and sending them to the front. Those with means sometimes bribe their way out of service, often by paying for a medical exemption.” The corruption became so widespread that Zelensky fired the heads of all the regional draft offices in August, but the move backfired as lack of leadership brought new recruitment nearly to a halt.
Morale is collapsing. Even patriots don’t want to die serving as canon fodder for a doomed military strategy. Within the officer ranks, there is growing dissension bordering on mutiny. One close Zelensky aide complained to Shuster that some front-line commanders have begun refusing orders to advance even when they come directly from the office of the president. When Shuster asked a senior military officer about those complaints, the officer said that some officers have no choice but to refuse orders that are simply impossible. He told a story about an order in early October to “retake” the city of Horlivka, a “strategic outpost” in Eastern Ukraine that’s been under Russian control for almost a decade. “The answer came in the form of a question,” writes Shuster. “With what?” With no recruits and no artillery, Zelensky’s dreams of driving the Russians from every inch of Ukrainian territory cannot be achieved. He can only fight futilely to the last Ukrainian, and there is a diminishing number of Ukrainians willing to die in service of that strategy.
Corruption is uncontrollable. It has long been a “Putin talking point” that Ukraine’s government was shot through with corruption. And yet Zelensky has been getting an earful about exactly that from its U.S. and NATO allies, who don’t want to see their billions of dollars in aid disappear into the pockets of corrupt officials. Zelensky has taken some actions, like the sacking of his Minister of Defense Oleksiy Reznikov for corrupt procurement practices. But to really root out corruption, Zelensky will have to fire most of his government. A top presidential adviser admitted as much to Shuster once his audio recorder had been shut off: “People are stealing like there is no tomorrow.”
“Nobody believes in our victory like I do,” Zelensky told TIMEin what became the pull quote for this cover story. He may have to read Shuster’s piece to see just how right he is, as he seems surrounded by aides who no longer believe in Ukraine’s war strategy or Zelensky’s leadership of it.
Zelensky no doubt intended the quote as a Churchillian “never surrender” exhortation to courage and resolve in the face of Ukraine’s “darkest hour” rather than as an admission of delusional optimism. Yet his dogmatic insistence on total victory and refusal to consider peace negotiations belie a loss of touch with reality that ought to worry both his countrymen and allies.
To be sure, Zelensky is not alone in his refusal to face reality. The Biden administration has proposed another $61 billion for Ukraine’s war effort without explaining how this will produce a different result than the $100+ billion already appropriated. Undoubtedly Zelensky’s optimism was fueled by Biden’s repeated promises of total support for "as long as it takes." But it’s becoming increasingly clear that the U.S. is in no position to deliver on that promise indefinitely. It has too many other global commitments, including to Israel, which compete for limited resources.
Alone among his team, Zelensky seems not to understand how circumstances have changed. Shuster and TIME try their best to portray him as the last stalwart of the Ukrainian cause, but the fact that his own inner circle is the source of the torrent of revelations and complaints suggests that his immovability owes not to Churchillian resolve but rather to an impervious bunker mentality.
David Oliver Sacks is Founder and General Partner of Craft Ventures and cohost of the All-In Podcast.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskiy during a joint press conference with Prime Minister of Denmark Mette Frederiksen in Kyiv, Ukraine September 06, 2023 (paparazzza/shutterstock)
On Tuesday, RS published a story about how Israel is paying a cohort of 14-18 social media influencers around $7,000 per post to promote the country’s image in the American public. The campaign, nicknamed “Esther Project,” is coordinated by a newly created firm working out of a Capitol Hill rowhouse called Bridges Partners, and is slated to run through November.
However, as of publication, it is unclear who the influencers themselves are. According to the contract, they were supposed to begin posting on behalf of Israel in July, yet have not registered as foreign agents. By not registering as foreign agents and disclosing their names, the influencers are likely in violation of the U.S.’s premier foreign lobbying law, the Foreign Agents Registration Act. FARA experts say they must also mark their content on social media so that viewers know it is content sponsored by Israel.
Ben Freeman, the Director of the Democratizing Foreign Policy program at the Quincy Institute, said that the law in this case is straightforward. “If you're being paid by a foreign government to influence the American public on that government's behalf you should register under FARA.”
Freeman added, “If these influencers are knowingly accepting money from the Israeli government to produce content for the Israeli government that's being viewed by thousands or millions of their followers in the U.S., it's not at all clear why they would not be required to register under FARA.”
Currently, the Bridges Partners contract only lists one registered foreign agent: Uri Steinberg, a consultant who owns a 50% stake in the firm.
A lawyer who specializes in FARA who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter explained that the influencers themselves are required to register as foreign agents.
“Anyone who is distributing material propaganda and other informational materials aimed at the United States audience on behalf of a foreign government agency would need to be disclosed somewhere, including potentially by filing a short form registration,” the lawyer said during a phone call with RS.
In September of last year, the Department of Justice indicted two RT employees that were covertly funding well-known influencers like Tim Pool, Dave Rubin, and Benny Jonhson on behalf of Russia through a Tennessee-based company called Tenet Media. The influencers claimed they were unaware of the source of the funding. To warrant criminal penalties, violators of FARA have to do so “willfully.”
To stay apprised of the law, FARA experts explained the influencers working for Israel also need to include a disclaimer on social media posts that their content is paid for by the Israeli government, either in the post itself or on the creator’s profile.
Many registered foreign agents already attach this disclaimer on social media. For instance, below is a post on X from former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, now a registered foreign agent of the Republic of Srpska, a political entity in Bosnia.
Freeman noted that this statement, known as a "conspicuous statement,” is “basically the foreign influence equivalent of the standard sponsorship flagged posts you see all over social media.”
“It just lets social media users know that what they're seeing is being paid for by the Israeli government, and then they can judge it accordingly,” he added.
Currently, it does not appear that any of the 14-18 influencers working for Bridges Partners have included the conspicuous statement on major social media platforms. A search for the standardized statement with the firm’s name, Bridges Partners, on X, Tik Tok, and Instagram did not yield any immediate results. Steinberg, the part-owner of Bridges Partners, did not respond to a request for comment.
Social media Influencers have taken several trips to Israel in recent months, but it’s unclear if they have any relation to Esther Project. Israel365 Action organized a trip of influencers to Israel in August, funded in part through a $86,000 contract from the Israeli Foreign Ministry. One of the attendees, Lance Johnston, said that his views of Israel evolved during the visit. “I’m now more like, I’m fine with sending them weapons,” he said. Last Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with another cohort of several influencers, in a meeting facilitated by a group called Generation Zion.
In a post on X, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) pointed out that influencers working for a foreign government are likely running afoul of the law by not identifying themselves. “Any social media influencer, if they are getting paid by a foreign country, they have to register under FARA,” she said in an interview with One America News.
“In this particular case, the foreign government is pursuing a specific agenda, it is not just friendly relations between our countries. There is a war going on in Gaza,” added former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), who hosts the OAN program.
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Top photo credit: Abdel Fattah El Sisi, President of Egypt, in Cairo, Egypt September 29, 2025. Abdulla Al Bedwawi/UAE Presidential Court/Handout via REUTERS
Various forces, from tariffs to wars to the emerging multipolar world order, are potentially reshaping the Middle East and its alliances, and Egypt is playing a leading role. However, Egypt’s vision is bumping up against the reality that its dependence on Washington limits those shifting alliances and Egypt’s ability to play a leading role in them.
Time will tell how far Egypt can go.
Egypt appears to be asserting itself, or trying to, when it comes to Israel and its war in Gaza. There have been some recent developments on this score.
On September 15, Egypt’s President Sisi gave a landmark speech at the Emergency Arab-Islamic Summit in Qatar. The speech contained three shocking moments. The first was Sisi identifying Israel as “the enemy.” That was not only the first time Sisi has called Israel an enemy since coming to power in 2014, but the first time an Egyptian official has called Israel an enemy in the almost half century since Anwar Sadat went to Israel in 1977.
The second was Sisi’s warning “to the people of Israel,” with reference to the Abraham Accords, that “what is currently unfolding… erodes opportunities for any new peace agreements.” But that was just the introduction. More significant was the warning that followed, that it “may even abort existing peace accords with the nations of the region” referring obliquely to the 1979 Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty.
And the third was his call for an Arab-Islamic security alliance. Sisi said that “it has become imperative for us to establish an Arab-Islamic mechanism for coordination and cooperation to enable us all to confront the major security, political, and economic challenges surrounding us.” In a stunning line, Sisi said that it must be clearly seen that “the geography of any Arab country extends from the Ocean to the Gulf and its umbrella is wide enough for all Islamic and peace-loving countries.”
The Jerusalem Post reports that the NATO-like arrangement would be a defensive umbrella capable of reacting rapidly to protect any Arab state under attack. Egypt is reportedly prepared to contribute a force of 20,000 and to place an Egyptian general in command of the force.
Another key movement is the buildup of Egyptian forces in the Sinai Peninsula that seems to contravene that 1979 treaty with Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has presented U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio with a list of violations and has asked the United States, as guarantor of that treaty, to pressure Egypt to scale down.
Fearing a push of Palestinians across its border with Gaza, Egypt has deployed additional forces to the region, bringing its total force to about 40,000 soldiers. That is nearly twice as many as allowed by its treaty with Israel. Accompanying the troops are armored vehicles, advanced Chinese-made air defense systems, and M60 battle tanks. Egypt has reportedly warned that within 72 hours of any mass wave of Palestinians moving from Gaza into Egypt, they would double their troops and deploy heavy weaponry and helicopters.
Israel says that Egypt has established military infrastructure, built underground facilities that could store missiles, and extended runways for fighter jets. And there are reports that Egypt “has decided to reduce coordination with Israel until further notice” and that Egypt is “planning to restructure its security communications with Israel.”
The military build-up is the physical expression of Egypt’s fear of a mass movement of Palestinians out of Gaza and into Egypt. Egypt doesn’t want to be a party to any movement of Palestinians out of their land. They fear, after Netanyahu’s warning that Israel could strike Hamas leaders “wherever they are,” that Egypt could be a target, too, since Cairo hosts some Hamas leaders as part of the mediating process. They fear that Hamas fighters who move into Egypt could attack Israel from Egyptian soil, inviting Israeli retaliation.
Also, domestically, Egypt has its own problems with local Islamist insurgencies and does not relish any influx of Hamas fighters.
Meanwhile, Egypt’s tense relations with Iran have been growing more friendly.
Iran broke relations with Egypt in 1979. Iran has seen Egypt as a betrayer, and Egypt has seen Iran as a regional threat. After the 2024 BRICS expansion, though, Egypt and Iran found themselves as members of the same international organization whose purpose is to balance U.S. hegemony in the new multipolar world.
That, it turned out, was just the beginning. In June of 2025, Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi met with Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and President el-Sisi in Cairo. “After many years,” Araghchi posted, “diplomacy between Iran and Egypt has entered a new phase. The level of political interaction and cooperation, and more importantly, the level of trust and confidence in relations between the two countries, is unprecedented.” And Egypt agreed. Abdelatty said, “There is a mutual desire to develop our relations, taking into account the concerns and perspectives of each side.”
The meetings produced an agreement “to launch periodic consultations at the sub-ministerial level to address aspects of bilateral cooperation.”
Iran is not the only Muslim country that Egypt is warming up to. Relations with Turkey fell apart a dozen years ago when Mohammed Morsi was ousted as president of Egypt. In July 2023, Egypt and Turkey took steps to normalizing relations and restored ambassadors to each other’s countries. Last year, Sisi and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited each other’s countries for the first time in 12 years. Last week, the two countries held joint naval drills for the first time in 13 years.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said that relations between Turkey and Egypt are at their “best levels in modern history.”
But how far can it go?
All of this signals a shift away from Israel, but Egypt may not really take “any concrete measures” beyond rhetoric and these geopolitical exercises, as Annelle Sheline, Research Fellow for the Middle East program at the Quincy Institute, told me, because “the unpopular government of Egypt depends on handouts from the U.S. and is unlikely to do anything that would threaten the $1.3 billion it receives from the U.S. each year.”
Stephen Zunes, professor of politics and Program Director for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of San Francisco, agrees. Zunes told Responsible Statecraft that public opinion may be making Sisi “feel emboldened to pursue a more independent foreign policy.” However, in addition to Egypt’s economic and military dependence on the United States, “Sisi is not that popular, Egypt is struggling economically, they don't have the clout of the smaller but much richer oil monarchies, and regional politics is far more complicated than it used to be.”
Further frustrating Egypt’s position is that it is increasingly dependent on Israel for its energy needs. In August, a $35 billion deal was signed that further increases Egypt’s natural gas dependence on Israel. Once a net exporter of LNG, Egypt has been struggling to meet its own energy needs. Israel has reportedly threatened to suspend the agreement in response to Egypt’s military buildup in violation of the peace agreement. “Cairo’s moves are driven by a non-negotiable domestic imperative: keeping the lights on,” wrote Elfadil Ibrihim this summer.
Just as importantly, even as Sisi made his comments about Israel being “the enemy,” it has been harder for the Egyptian people to do the same. There has been a crackdown on Gaza war protests since Oct. 7, 2023. More recently, attempts by Egyptian activists to join the Gaza flotilla have been met with “threats by security agencies,” and three activists suddenly disappeared this week, according to reports. There seems to be a real limit on this new independent spirit.
This is a sound warning against reading too much into recent moves by the government, say experts. Time will tell if any of it leads to a real reshaping of the region.
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Top image credit: President Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin participate in a joint press conference in Anchorage, Alaska, Friday, August 15, 2025. (Official White House Photo by Daniel Torok)
The deep freeze in U.S.-Russia relations shows occasional, promising cracks. It happened recently not on the primary issue of conflict — the war on Ukraine — but on a matter of mutual survival. During the United Nations General Assembly President Donald Trump announced an initiative to address one of arms control's most intractable problems: verifying compliance with the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC).
"To prevent potential disasters, I'm announcing today that my administration will lead an international effort to enforce the biological weapons convention by pioneering an AI verification system that everyone can trust,” Trump said. He framed this as an urgent priority, claiming "many countries are continuing extremely risky research into bioweapons and man-made pathogens."
The proposal found immediate endorsement in Moscow. Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov offered unusually direct support, calling the initiative "brilliant in itself" and declaring that "Moscow supports it." Crucially, Peskov proposed concrete next steps, suggesting the U.S. proposal should be negotiated and formally codified in international agreements.
This high-level response is significant for at least two reasons: first, it signals to Washington that Moscow is open to dialogue on issues of strategic stability, despite Trump’s latest rhetorical shift suggesting Ukraine can win the war against Russia and calling Russia a “paper tiger.”
And second, it marks a departure from Moscow's persistent accusations of the U.S. running bioweapons development in Ukraine under the cover of legitimate health research (these allegations were never proven). Given that context, Peskov's constructive tone was particularly noteworthy.
That creates a tangible diplomatic opening with a critical deadline looming: the meetings of the BWC working group and of the state parties is scheduled for December 15-17 in Geneva. The U.S. could use Russia’s positive reaction to discreetly test the approach known as compartmentalization: separate the intractable conflict in Ukraine from managing existential risks between adversarial great powers.
Contrary to hawks who’d oppose any diplomatic engagement with Russia, engaging on BWC does not “legitimize” Russia’s war in Ukraine. It protects a fundamental U.S. security interest that exists independently of it. The inclusion of China in the same context would broaden the initiative’s strategic value. Beijing’s disposition is certainly worth testing — unlike on nuclear weapons where it guards its sovereignty zealously, its position on the biological weapons may be more cooperative.
The imperative to focus on BWC is even more compelling given that, unlike other weapons treaties, the bioweapons convention has never provided for a verification mechanism. The obstacles are substantial. Experts note that much of the legitimate biological research could be dual-use — both for benevolent (medicines) and malevolent (weapons) ends. The research involves thousands of institutions worldwide, while potential weapons programs could be hidden anywhere from industrial facilities to university laboratories.
The last serious effort to create a verification system collapsed in 2001 when the Bush administration rejected a proposed mechanism for the BWC, upending seven years of multilateral negotiations. The situation was further exacerbated by the mysterious, and still unresolved, anthrax incidents that in the febrile post-September 11 atmosphere caused panic of a terrorist biological attack.
After years of paralysis on that front, BWC members agreed in 2022 to resume the work on verification mechanisms. The December meeting in Geneva to review and codify the relevant working group’s recommendations (already drafted but not yet made public) offers an opportunity to advance on the initiative Trump talked about at the U.N.
However, any progress would require a patient, sustained diplomatic engagement that has characterized past successes in arms control, particularly in multilateral frameworks. This pace and method clash with the current administration’s preference for unilateralism and quick wins.
Trump’s own transactional approach to foreign relations may be another self-made hurdle. He may have undermined his own opening in the same U.N. speech by telling world leaders their countries "are going to hell" while appearing to question the purpose of the U.N. — hardly a way to build the multilateral cooperation necessary for success of an initiative he claims to champion.
Furthermore, questions persist about the level of technical expertise within government agencies necessary to enhance Washington's ability to navigate this complex landscape. Developing a credible verification system, enhanced by harnessing the AI potential — while managing the legitimate privacy concerns and technical hurdles — requires deep institutional, technical and legal knowledge that appears to have diminished in recent years.
The path forward requires extensive dialogue and technical work. The fundamental question is whether the administration can maintain focus on this welcome, but complex initiative. The December meeting represents more than just another diplomatic gathering — it’s a test as to whether the political will can be found and sustained in Washington, Moscow, and Beijing to walk through the unexpected opening. Success would not signal friendship, but a mature, pragmatic recognition that some existential dangers demand cooperation even among adversaries — or perhaps particularly among them.
A successful outcome in Geneva, measured by even a modest agreement on core principles for verification, compliance, transparency, and the use of AI, could generate good will to be invested in future, more complex negotiations — with nuclear arms control at the forefront.
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