Morning Brief, Wednesday 3 June

Russia launched 73 missiles and 656 long-range drones at Ukrainian cities in the early hours of June 2, hitting Kyiv, Dnipro, Kharkiv and Kamianske after days of warnings and simulated raids. Ukrainian forces said they shot down 40 missiles and 602 drones, a high interception tally that still left enough weapons to collapse apartment floors, cut power and send families back into metro stations. Officials reported at least 23 dead and more than 130 wounded, with Dnipro suffering the worst toll after a residential building was destroyed.

Volodymyr Zelensky renewed his push for more US-made Patriot systems, arguing that ballistic and hypersonic missiles exposed the weak point in Ukraine's layered defences. Moscow said it targeted military-industrial facilities and critical infrastructure, while Ukrainian officials and the UN pointed to civilian casualties and damaged residential areas. The attack came as US-mediated talks stalled and as both sides traded long-range strikes, including Ukrainian drones aimed at Russian territory and Russian claims of retaliation for a deadly strike in Russian-controlled Luhansk.

Ukraine also recaptured about 282 square kilometres in May, a small but politically useful reversal after months of Russian pressure. That makes the missile war more than punishment from the air: it is a contest over whether Russia can break civilian life faster than Ukraine can rebuild defences and recover ground.

Donald Trump berated Benjamin Netanyahu after the Israeli prime minister announced plans to bomb Beirut's Dahiyeh suburb in response to what Israel described as Hezbollah ceasefire violations. The American president feared the strikes would wreck talks with Iran over reopening the Strait of Hormuz, which has been shut since the US-Israeli offensive against Iran began on February 28. Trump later said he had turned the episode around, but Israel still struck southern Lebanon, where Lebanese officials said a strike near a hospital in Tyre killed four people and wounded 127.

The Gulf offered little comfort. Iran fired missiles and drones toward Kuwait and Bahrain, according to US Central Command, while Iran's Revolutionary Guards claimed they hit US targets and Centcom denied any impacts. The US then struck a ground-control station on Iran's Qeshm Island and said it shot down Iranian drones launched at civilian vessels. Earlier, Centcom disabled a Botswana-flagged tanker sailing toward Kharg Island, part of a US blockade that it says has disabled six commercial vessels and diverted 122 since mid-April.

Trump wants a deal that restrains Iran's nuclear work, reopens Hormuz and quiets Lebanon, while Netanyahu insists Israel must retain room to strike Hezbollah. Iran wants sanctions relief, oil revenues and leverage over the strait. The oddity is stark: the loudest American pressure now falls not only on Tehran, but also on Washington's closest regional ally.

The World Meteorological Organization warned that El Niño is likely to develop between June and August, with an 80% probability of emergence and a roughly 90% chance of lasting at least through November. NOAA also issued an El Niño watch and put the odds of a peak between December and February at 96%. Sea temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific have risen since late April, while subsurface temperatures in the tropical Pacific are running about 6C above the historical average.

El Niño shifts rain, wind and heat patterns across continents. The WMO expects above-average temperatures almost everywhere from June to August, with heavier rainfall likely in parts of southern South America, the southern United States, the Horn of Africa and Central Asia, and drought risks in Australia, Central America, Indonesia and parts of South Asia. The warmer background matters: the planet is already about 1.3C hotter than pre-industrial levels, and the last El Niño helped make 2024 the hottest year ever measured.

Governments have some warning this time. The EU plans to deploy a record number of firefighters and aircraft in high-risk Mediterranean countries, while health and agriculture agencies prepare for heat, crop damage and mosquito-borne disease. A natural Pacific swing now lands on an unnatural planetary fever, so preparedness will decide how much of the forecast becomes damage.

Donald Trump named Bill Pulte, the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency and chairman of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as acting director of national intelligence. Pulte has no known intelligence or national-security background, yet the role coordinates 18 US spy agencies and normally demands deep expertise. He will keep his housing posts while taking the temporary intelligence job, and the Vacancies Act could let him serve for up to 210 days without Senate confirmation.

The choice alarmed Democrats and unsettled several Republicans because Pulte has used mortgage records to make criminal referrals against Trump critics, including Lisa Cook, Letitia James, Adam Schiff and Jerome Powell. None has produced a successful prosecution, and the Government Accountability Office is examining how the FHFA handles mortgage-fraud investigations. John Cornyn, Thom Tillis and Bill Cassidy all signalled doubts about Pulte's qualifications, a rare public chill from the president's own party.

The appointment follows Tulsi Gabbard's resignation and fits a broader pattern in which loyalty counts heavily for sensitive posts. Intelligence chiefs do not just brief presidents; they protect the machinery that tells presidents inconvenient things. If that machinery becomes another instrument of political combat, the damage will be measured less in headlines than in warnings missed or softened.

The US Supreme Court allowed Alabama to use a Republican-backed congressional map for the 2026 midterms, blocking a lower-court ruling that found intentional discrimination against Black voters. The justices split 6-3 along ideological lines, with the conservative majority saying the lower court failed to respect a presumption that lawmakers acted in good faith. The map leaves one majority-Black district out of seven, down from two, and could give Republicans a 6-1 advantage in Alabama's House delegation.

The decision lands after the court's April ruling in Louisiana v. Callais weakened Voting Rights Act litigation by making intentional discrimination harder to prove. Alabama's Republican leaders had pressed to revive the 2023 plan before special primary deadlines, while voting-rights challengers argued the state had doubled down after earlier losses. The immediate beneficiary is the national Republican House campaign, which can now chase one more favourable seat in a chamber where narrow margins define everything.

The ruling will encourage other Republican-led states in the South to test how far the court's new tolerance for redistricting can stretch. For voters, the map decides more than lines on a page; it decides whether communities can realistically choose a representative. The 2026 House race has begun not with candidate launches, but with cartography.