RUSSIE PERSPECTIVE

Russia covers day 26 of the Iran war by maximizing American embarrassment. TASS headlines on 'growing American losses' and 'Iranian rejection of Washington's ultimatum,' framing the conflict as proof of the end of American hegemony. RT devotes extensive coverage to civilian casualties in Iran and Lebanon, images American media broadcast less widely.

RIA Novosti highlights the 82nd Airborne deployment as a dangerous escalation, drawing a Vietnam parallel: 'a military engagement deepening inexorably.' The Kremlin uses the conflict to reinforce its multipolar world narrative: BRICS must take responsibility to end the war, not Washington which started it.

The economic dimension is highlighted: Russia benefits from high oil prices caused by the war, indirectly financing its own military operation in Ukraine. Novaya Gazeta, from abroad, is the only one noting this macabre irony.

The massive launch of 'a thousand Geraniums' (Iranian drones) by Russia on Ukraine on the same day reveals a rarely noted contradiction: Moscow denounces the American war on Iran while using Iranian weapons to bomb Ukraine. Shahed/Geranium drones, supplied by Tehran, are the same ones Iran uses against Israel.