Air raid sirens blare in Zolochiv, a small town in the Kharkiv region, where dozens of destroyed buildings line the streets that few civilians walk along. The alarms were not the first that day, and they would not be the last.
Zolochiv is just 10 miles away from the nearest front lines but holds no strategic military value. Still, it is pummeled almost daily, and this air alert warned residents to seek cover immediately as a Russian Molniya drone flew over the town. Some residents sat outdoors at the town’s coffee shop or tended to their needs at one of the few remaining grocery stores.
Nearly three and a half years into the war, frequent attacks on Zolochiv have become the norm, but life carries on regardless of the dangers, and their constant frustrations that not enough is being done to end the fighting.
Residents of Zolochiv told the Daily Beast they are angry at both the U.S. administration and President Donald Trump, who they believe are turning their backs on Ukraine.
Minutes after the alarms lifted, Valentina, 54, stood outside her large white van where her granddaughter, Ulyasha, 10, was scrolling aimlessly on a tablet. She was parked outside one of Zolochiv’s last remaining drug stores, waiting for her husband to return from his shopping.
“Trump himself doesn’t know much about Ukraine. I personally invite him. Let him stay at my house. Let him sit under the drones and under the KAB bombs and then go talk about negotiations,” said Valentina.
Valentina echoes the views of more and more residents in Zolochiv whom I have spoken with during trips to the town over the last 18 months. Previously, all residents would voice appreciation for the U.S. and former President Joe Biden’s unwavering support for Ukraine, noting the financial, military, and medical assistance the White House secured for Kyiv during that time.
They now ask me, “Can you tell me what is happening in America?” and “Do you like Trump?”
There is no data on Trump’s approval rating in Ukraine, but in Zolochiv, the residents are clear: They distrust the U.S. president and believe he is siding with Vladimir Putin.
Speaking from his office, its windows boarded up since being shattered in an attack last year, Deputy Mayor Vitaly Sadovii told the Daily Beast he hopes Russia will not try to reach Zolochiv and that it is heavily fortified. But he is well aware that the situation could change.
“My heart shrinks when I look at the SMS [warnings]: Kab missile to Kharkiv region,” said Sadovii. As the mayor spoke, the air raid alarms began again, and Sadovii moved to the basement of the building to wait for the threat to lift. He said the hardest part of living in Zolochiv for him is knowing that residents are anxious and fearful for the fate of their town.
On July 15, Trump gave Russian President Vladimir Putin an ultimatum—accept a peace deal with Ukraine within 50 days or face sanctions on energy exports, 100 percent tariffs on Russia and secondary sanctions on countries that buy Russian oil. On July 28, Trump said he has brought forward the deadline to “10 to 12 days”—so early August instead of early September.
Trump’s remarks over the last six months have been a wave of often-hostile rhetoric that has led many in Ukraine to wonder where the U.S. leader’s loyalties lie. For many Ukrainians, 50 days to potential peace was simply too long.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has stressed that no one wants the war to end more than Ukrainians. Trump, on the campaign trail, vowed that he would put an end to the war in Ukraine on day one of his presidency, a deadline that was extended to his first 100 days in office, and which ran out in April.
Back in Zolochiv, at a flower shop near Anatoly’s store, the owner, a woman in her 70s named Zhenya, motioned towards the back room as the air raid alarms began once more. She walked to a thick metal basement door and raised it to show steps leading down to a dark room that served as a bomb shelter.
“For all of this to be happening in the 21st century, a war like this, it’s a catastrophe. When, in the middle of the night, we take our little [grandchildren] and drag them into the cellar because bombs are flying at us,” exclaimed Zhenya.
“We wish Trump would come here and sit in the cellar with our kids. Let him see the truth for himself, not the lies people babble about,” she said. “I don’t even consider them [Russians] human. You can’t even call them beasts.”
Zhenya and her husband, Vasily, 72, have owned their shop for decades and have raised their children and grandchildren in the village.
Before the war, Vasily said that people bought flowers for birthdays and other celebrations, but now, “It’s all for funerals. People forget about birthdays.”
When there are attacks during the day, he said that people run to the shelter at his flower shop. While he is at home at night, he sleeps with his phone on his chest so he can run to his basement. “This is how we live,” said Vasily.
Two days earlier, the husband and wife learned that their granddaughter’s husband, a 44-year-old border guard, was killed in a Russian attack. Vasily said, “It hurts. It hurts the soul. In the 21st century, such a war. It’s a catastrophe.”
