Prime Minister Naftali Bennett met Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on Saturday to discuss the war in Ukraine and later spoke by phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Bennett's spokesperson said.
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Bennett is coordinating his efforts in the crisis with the United States, France and Germany, an Israeli official said.
After his meeting with Putin, Bennett headed to Berlin for talks with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, his spokesperson said.
French President Emmanuel Macron had spoken to Bennett before he flew to Moscow to brief him on his own conversations with Putin, the Elysée Palace said.
"They will stay in touch with the aim of obtaining a ceasefire, and this in coordination with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz," an Elysée official said.
Israel, at the behest of Zelenskyy, has offered to mediate in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, though officials have previously played down expectations of any breakthrough.
In their three-hour meeting in the Kremlin, the Israeli official said, Bennett also raised with Putin the issue of the large Jewish community caught up in the war in Ukraine.
Israel will send medical teams to Ukraine next week to set up a field hospital that will provide treatment for refugees, its Health Ministry said.
While Israel, a close ally of the United States, has condemned the Russian invasion, voiced solidarity with Kyiv and sent humanitarian aid to Ukraine, it has said it will maintain contact with Moscow in the hope of helping to ease the crisis.
Bennett and Putin also discussed the ongoing talks between world powers, including Russia, and Iran about reviving a 2015 nuclear deal.
On Saturday, Russia said on Saturday that Western sanctions imposed on it over its invasion of Ukraine had become a stumbling block for the nuclear deal.
Bennett's spokesman said the prime minister's flight to Moscow on Shabbat was permissible under the principle of "pikuah nefesh" – saving lives.
Bennett was joined by Ukrainian-born Housing and Construction Minister Zeev Elkin. Elkin had in the past accompanied former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as an interpreter.
Bennett's office said he spoke twice with Zelenskyy after the three-hour meeting.
This is utter madness. https://t.co/bMulNMfZWr
— Oryx (@oryxspioenkop) March 5, 2022
Putin warned Saturday that Ukrainian statehood was in jeopardy and likened the West's sanctions on Russia to "declaring war," while a promised ceasefire in the besieged port city of Mariupol collapsed amid scenes of terror.
With the Kremlin's rhetoric growing fiercer and a reprieve from fighting dissolving, Russian troops continued to shell encircled cities and the number of Ukrainians forced from their country grew to 1.4 million. By nighttime Russian forces had intensified their shelling of Mariupol, while dropping powerful bombs on residential areas of Chernihiv, a city north of Kyiv, Ukrainian officials said.
Bereft mothers mourned slain children, wounded soldiers were fitted with tourniquets and doctors worked by the light of their cellphones as bleakness and desperation pervaded. Crowds of men lined up in the capital to join the Ukrainian military.
Putin continued to pin the blame for the war squarely on the Ukrainian leadership and slammed their resistance to the invasion.
"If they continue to do what they are doing, they are calling into question the future of Ukrainian statehood," he said. "And if this happens, it will be entirely on their conscience."
He also hit out at Western sanctions that have crippled Russia's economy and sent the value of its currency tumbling.
"These sanctions that are being imposed, they are akin to declaring war," he said during a televised meeting with flight attendants from Russian airline Aeroflot. "But thank God, we haven't got there yet."
Russia's financial system suffered yet another blow as Mastercard and Visa announced they were suspending operations in the country.
Ten days after Russian forces invaded, the struggle to enforce the temporary cease-fires in Mariupol and the eastern city of Volnovakha showed the fragility of efforts to stop the fighting across Ukraine.
Ukrainian officials said Russian artillery fire and airstrikes had prevented residents from leaving before the agreed-to evacuations got underway. Putin accused Ukraine of sabotaging the effort.
Meanwhile, the Russian air force reportedly suffered significant losses on Saturday. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry reported that nine Russian aircraft had been shot down, including: an Su-30SM multirole aircraft; an Su-34 strike aircraft; three Su-25 close air support aircraft; two Mi-24/35 attack helicopters; an Mi-8 transport helicopter; and an Orlan-10 UAV.
According to videos from Ukraine, at least two Russian pilots have been taken prisoner by Ukrainian forces.
A third round of talks between Russia and Ukraine will take place Monday, according to Davyd Arakhamia, a member of the Ukrainian delegation. He gave no additional details, including where they would take place.
Previous meetings were held in Belarus and led to the failed ceasefire agreement to create humanitarian corridors for the evacuation of children, women and older people from besieged cities, where pharmacies have run bare, hundreds of thousands face food and water shortages, and the injured have been succumbing to their wounds.
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Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boychenko said thousands of residents had gathered for safe passage out of the city of 430,000 when shelling began and the evacuation was stopped. Later in the day, he said the attack had escalated further.
"The city is in a very, very difficult state of siege," Boychenko told Ukrainian TV. "Relentless shelling of residential blocks is ongoing, airplanes have been dropping bombs on residential areas. The Russian occupants are using heavy artillery, including Grad multiple rocket launchers."
Russia has made significant advances in the south, seeking to cut off Ukraine's access to the sea. Capturing Mariupol could allow Russia to establish a land corridor to Crimea, which it annexed in 2014.
Meanwhile the head of the Chernihiv region said Russia has dropped powerful bombs on residential areas of the city of the same name, which has a population of 290,000. Vyacheslav Chaus posted a photo online of what he said was an undetonated FAB-500, a 1,100-pound (500-kilogram) bomb.
"Usually this weapon is used against military-industrial facilities and fortified structures," Chaus said.
In a speech to Ukrainians, Zelenskyy pointed to "the 500-kilogram bombs that were dropped on the houses of Ukrainians. Look at Borodyanka, at the destroyed schools, at the blown-up kindergartens. At the damaged Kharkiv Assumption Cathedral. Look what Russia has done."
The West has broadly backed Ukraine, offering aid and weapons and slapping Russia with vast sanctions. But the fight itself has been left to Ukrainians, who have expressed a mixture of courageous resolve and despondency.
"Ukraine is bleeding," Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said in a video released Saturday, "but Ukraine has not fallen."
Russian troops advanced on a third nuclear power plant, having already taken control of one of the four operating in the country and the closed plant in Chernobyl, Zelenskyy told US lawmakers.
Zelenskyy pleaded with the lawmakers for additional help, specifically fighter planes to help secure the skies over Ukraine, even as he insisted Russia was being defeated.
"We're inflicting losses on the occupants they could not see in their worst nightmare," Zelenskyy said.
Russian troops took control of the southern port city of Kherson this week. Although they have encircled Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Chernihiv and Sumy, Ukrainian forces have managed to keep control of key cities in central and southeastern Ukraine, Zelenskyy said.
US President Joe Biden called Zelenskyy early Sunday, Kyiv time, to discuss Russia sanctions and speeding US assistance to Ukraine. The White House said the conversation also covered talks between Russia and Ukraine but did not give details.
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in Poland to meet with the prime minister and foreign minister, a day after attending a NATO meeting in Brussels in which the alliance pledged to step up support for eastern flank members.
Blinken also spoke by phone with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who said Beijing opposes any moves that "add fuel to the flames" in Ukraine, according to the Chinese Foreign Ministry. Blinken said the world is watching to see which nations stand up for freedom and sovereignty, the State Department said.
In the wake of Western sanctions, Aeroflot, Russia's flagship state-owned airline, announced plans to halt all international flights except to Belarus starting Tuesday.
The death toll of the conflict was difficult to measure. The UN human rights office said at least 351 civilians have been confirmed killed since the Feb. 24 invasion, but the true number is probably much higher.
Ukraine's military is vastly outmatched by Russia's, but its professional and volunteer forces have fought back with fierce tenacity. Even in cities that have fallen, there were signs of resistance.
A vast Russian armored column threatening Ukraine's capital remained stalled outside Kyiv. Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovich said in the afternoon that the military situation was quieter overall and Russian forces hadn't "taken active actions since the morning."
The U.S. Congress was considering a request for $10 billion in emergency funding for humanitarian aid and security needs. The UN said it would increase its humanitarian operations both inside and outside Ukraine, and the Security Council scheduled a meeting for Monday on the worsening situation.
The UN World Food Program has warned of an impending hunger crisis in Ukraine, a major global wheat supplier, saying millions will need food aid "immediately."
Also on Saturday, Russia's foreign ministry called on European Union and NATO countries on Saturday to "stop pumping weapons" to Ukraine, the Russian RIA news agency said.
It said Moscow was particularly worried that portable anti-aerial Stinger missiles could end up in the hands of terrorists, posing a threat to airlines.
