When Israel first started bombing Iran, many in Russia saw it as an opportunity, a means of drawing support and attention away from Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned on Friday that the escalating Israel-Iran conflict is inadvertently helping Russia by driving up global oil prices, which in turn increases Moscow’s energy revenues and fuels its war machine.

Iran's strikes on Israel are self-defense and are "proportionate defensive operations directed exclusively at military objectives and associated infrastructure," Iran's U.N. Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani told the U.