Supporters of Ukraine have accused the US and its allies of showing double standards in rushing to Israel's air defence after refusing to intervene in Russian missile attacks on Kyiv for more than two years.

The "show of airborne prowess" in repelling Iran's attack on Israel, said Politico, "also pointed to a yawning difference in the way Western powers treat Israel compared to Ukraine".

What did the commentators say?
While Washington and other allies have provided Kyiv with tens of billions of dollars in military equipment and ammunition – including powerful air defences – since the war began, "they have not directly confronted Russian forces", said The New York Times. "It's very stupid, it's hypocrisy," a resident of the embattled Ukrainian city of Kharkiv told the paper. "And it's like some devaluation of Ukrainian lives."

When asked why the RAF couldn't shoot down drones over Ukraine as they did during Saturday's attack on Israel, Foreign Secretary David Cameron told LBC that doing so would risk a dangerous "escalation" involving "Nato troops directly engaging Russian troops".

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy countered on X that "Israel is not a Nato member, so no action, such as triggering Article 5, was required" – referring to the Nato provision on collective defence that regards an attack on one as an attack on all. "No one was dragged into the war," he wrote. "They simply contributed to the protection of human life."

But the US has "fundamentally different security relationships" with Israel and Ukraine, said The Wall Street Journal. The hesitancy towards a more combative stance against Russian attacks is "shaped by concerns" that Vladimir Putin "could resort to nuclear arms".

What next?
Iran's attack against Israel "adds a new element to the uncertainty over the prospects for long-delayed US aid for Ukraine", said Radio Free Europe.

The question now for obstructive US House Republicans, said The Independent, "is what change this new development has on the calculus around the supplemental aid package meant to bolster the militaries of both Israel and Ukraine".

A meteorite fragment that fell to earth in a Gloucestershire village may hold the answer to a question that has long puzzled scientists: where did our planet's water come from?

The Winchcombe meteorite "streaked from space into the atmosphere as a spectacular green fireball" in 2021, said The Times. Now, a new analysis published in the Meteoritics & Planetary Science journal, has revealed how it was heavily altered by water, as well as smashed apart and reformed multiple times, before falling to Earth.

What's so important about this meteorite?
Search teams managed to recover the meteorite from several sites around Winchcombe within days. This speedy response meant that the rocks weren't exposed to the Earth's atmosphere for an extended period, unlike most recovered meteorites. Scientists were able to carry out a level of analysis "virtually unprecedented for materials that weren't directly returned to Earth from space missions", said study co-author Dr Leon Hicks, from the University of Leicester.

What did the analysis reveal?
Closer analysis revealed that the meteorite was formed from eight types of CM chondrite, the most common variation of carbonaceous chondrite. The findings suggest the asteroid from which the meteorite originated had been smashed apart and reformed multiple times, possibly following collisions with other asteroids early in the solar system's history.

What does it tell us about Earth's water?
The new analysis also provided "insight into the very fine detail of how the rock was altered by water in space", said Luke Daly of the University of Glasgow, who led the research. One leading theory of how water came to Earth is that some was carried here in carbonaceous asteroids, much like that from which the Winchcombe meteorite originated. 

The Winchcombe sample appears to support this idea, because the isotopic signatures of the hydrogen and oxygen (the atomic ingredients for water) found in the meteorite is a close match for that seen in the ocean.

But carbonaceous chondrites probably aren't the only sources of the Earth's water. One leading theory suggests that much of it has been here since the Earth first formed. 

The apocalyptic setting of Amazon's new TV adaptation of the video game "Fallout" inevitably draws comparisons with 2023's mega hit "The Last of Us".

But not only are the "two shows tonally distinct from each other, they're also very differently structured", said The Independent. The new series, from "Westworld" showrunners Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner, "picks and chooses its iconography, characters and plot from across the game series".

And "rather than follow the source material to the letter", said The Verge, "it feels more important to strike the right tone". It's the "jokes, rather than its plot, that make it one of the most faithful – and best – video game adaptations".

The series is set amid "the blighted landscape of a nuclear-scoured California and the sickly sweet sterility of living in an underground bunker engineered to resemble a 1950s infomercial".

The plot spans "several threads primarily anchored by three characters", said Vulture. Lucy MacLean (Ella Purnell) is a "doe-eyed vault dweller" who ventures to the surface after her father is kidnapped. There's Maximus (Aaron Clifton Moten), a sweet young man who aspires to join the Brotherhood of Steel, a "militaristic religious order". And then there's the Ghoul, a noseless mutant of a "bounty hunter", played by Walton Goggins.

Amazon has "spared no expense" with this "genre-bending series", said The New York Times. The result is "satirical and self-aware, rich with ironic detail". Ultimately, "however fans respond to 'Fallout', no one can doubt the creators' commitment".

If only the West backed Ukraine as it did Israel
Marc Champion in Bloomberg
It is "time to call ourselves out over Ukraine", writes Marc Champion, pointing to the "shameful" contrast between the West's response to Iran's attacks on Israel versus Russia's on the European nation. Israel was "left almost untouched" by Saturday's bombardment, protected by Western allies. But Ukraine was "all but abandoned" during attacks on the same day, and risks "being first pulverised and then overrun at enormous cost – to Ukrainians, Europe and the US".

Donald Trump and American Justice
The New York Times editorial board
The trial of the "former and possibly future" US president has drawn criticism, says The New York Times editorial board. Donald Trump "relentlessly undermined the justice system while in office", but is now "enjoying the same protections" that he attempted to "deny to others during his term". Although the jury is responsible for the ultimate outcome, America will truly "weigh the evidence" of Trump's actions come November.

The cult of healthy eating is a recipe for life-long misery
Madeline Grant in The Telegraph
"For all the brouhaha about health cults", says Madeline Grant, it is somewhat ironic that the world's oldest living man is a "Scouser whose chippy tea is the highlight of his week". Yet constant advertising for "quack medicines and health apps" persists, and this pursuit of long life "doesn't come cheap". We must ditch these "joyless" pursuits. After all, "no health fad is worth taking up for two more years in a geriatric home".