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At least two Palestinian fighters attempted to carry out two coordinated car bombing attacks in the Gush Etzion area of the West Bank on August 30. No militia has claimed responsibility for the attack at the time of writing, though the attack targeting IDF settlements is consistent with recent Hamas threats to target Israeli settlers in the West Bank.
The Russian military command may have redeployed limited elements intended to reinforce Russia's priority offensive operation in the Pokrovsk direction to defend against the Ukrainian incursion in Kursk Oblast — suggesting that operational pressures from the Ukrainian incursion in Kursk Oblast are impacting Russian operations in every sector throughout the theater. Russian sources, including social media users, claimed on August 14 and 17 that at least a company of the Russian 15th Motorized Rifle Brigade (2nd Combined Arms Army [CAA], Central Military District [CMD]) redeployed from the Pokrovsk direction to Kursk Oblast.
Israel and Hamas are reportedly reviewing a draft agreement for the hostage-prisoner exchange component of ceasefire talks after working group-level negotiations over the exchange.
European Union (EU) member state officials continue to express divergent views about Ukraine's ability to use European-provided weapons to strike military targets in Russia.
The People's Republic of China (PRC) flew 32 military aircraft over the Taiwan Strait median line while ROC President Lai Ching-te was in Kinmen County to commemorate the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis. The PRC possibly used the flights to signal its opposition to Lai attending the commemoration ceremony. Kinmen is a group of Taiwan-controlled islands with a large military garrison roughly 3 kilometers from the coast of the PRC. Lai gave a speech in Kinmen County on August 23 during a commemoration ceremony on the 66th anniversary of the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis in 1958, when the PRC unleashed a heavy artillery barrage against Kinmen.
US and international health officials confirmed on August 29 that Israel has agreed to implement a temporary humanitarian pause in the Gaza Strip to vaccinate children against polio.
Russian forces are currently pursuing two immediate tactical efforts as part of their ongoing offensive operation to seize Pokrovsk — a tactical effort along the Novohrodivka-Hrodivka line east of Pokrovsk to seize Myrnohrad and advance up to Pokrovsk's outskirts, and another tactical effort along the Selydove-Ukrainsk-Hirnyk line southeast of Pokrovsk aimed at widening Russia's salient in the Pokrovsk direction and eliminating vulnerabilities to Ukrainian counterattacks.
North Africa–Sahel Engagement. Algeria and Morocco are vying for economic and political influence in the Sahel to assert themselves as regional leaders and legitimize their positions on the Western Sahara, a disputed territory on the coast of northwest Africa. Morocco is spearheading its engagement with the Sahel through an initiative to connect the landlocked central Sahel states to the Atlantic Ocean via a Moroccan port in Western Sahara.
Israeli forces conducted a large-scale counterterrorism operation in the West Bank on August 27 in order to degrade Palestinian militia networks there. The operation is responding to Hamas’ attempted suicide bombing in Tel Aviv on August 18 and is meant at least partly to prevent future suicide bombings in Israel.
Multiple reports from Western media indicate that the US government is prohibiting the United Kingdom (UK) from allowing Ukraine to use Storm Shadow missiles to strike military targets in Russia. The Financial Times (FT) reported on August 27 that a source familiar with the matter stated that Ukraine's use of British and French Storm Shadows may require access to American intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance in areas where Russian forces are jamming the GPS signals that the missiles use for targeting.... The Telegraph reported on August 27 that the UK government supports Ukraine's ability to strike military targets in Russia with Storm Shadow missiles but that the missiles also use unspecified, classified American systems, whose use requires US permission.