From under the ruins of a five-story building, of which only the first floor remains, in the very heart of the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, a well-groomed but breathless hand suddenly appears with nails covered in bright red varnish. collapsed, reports AFP.

On Thursday, seven rockets hit the city shortly after 5:00 a.m.

“The Russians continue to deliberately strike civilians to sow fear,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote on Twitter.

The young woman lived in a house overlooking the main thoroughfare of this industrial city, the largest in southwestern Ukraine, which is not controlled by Russia. About forty kilometers separated Zaporozhye from the artillery battles at the front.

The victim, whom the rescuers carefully pulled out from under the rubble, was most likely in bed when the building in which he lived was destroyed. Death found her in her underwear, with her eyes open.

An hour later, after rescuers cleared the area of ​​tons of rubble, firefighters doused the ruins with hectoliters of water, from which thick smoke billowed even seven hours after the impact, and another body was found.

It is impossible to imagine who it could have been, man or woman, young or old, after hours spent in the fire, all four limbs were broken. The body is quickly placed in a black bag and then evacuated.

Officially, one person died and seven were injured on Thursday morning in Zaporizhzhia. But this assessment is only partial.

AFP saw two bodies in a building on the main street. According to one of the members of the response group, there could be “six to ten” victims. A third body was found elsewhere, according to a rescue worker who declined to give his name to AFP.

Oksana Beketova, head of the Zaporizhia Red Cross, told AFP that the body was found at a car wash, and the woman was killed in her home.

“We continue to ask people to evacuate. (But) two bus stops away, people are still walking in the park,” says Beketova, hoping that after these heavy bombings, “people will take the chance to save themselves.”

“For the first time in my life, I feel pure hatred,” says one Ukrainian

“Many people will go to other cities: families with children, elderly people,” predicts Ihor Osolodko, a 25-year-old musician who, together with dozens of other volunteers, came to help clear the rubble of a completely destroyed building brick by brick.

“For the first time in my life, I feel pure hatred,” he continues. “It’s absurd, it’s unreal. We just have to rely on our military and live with this terror until it’s over, until we win.”

Last Friday, on the outskirts of Zaporizhzhia, in a parking lot, 31 people were killed by Russian rocket fire. Apart from one dead policeman, the other 30 were civilians trying to return to the Russian-controlled part of Ukraine.

Kyiv and Moscow blamed each other for this explosion.

Russian President Vladimir Putin completed the proposed annexation of four Ukrainian territories (Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia) on Wednesday, but the Kremlin has not yet confirmed which geographic areas of these regions will be annexed.

While the Ukrainian military said Thursday it had recaptured 400 square kilometers of territory in the Kherson region, no one yet understands whether the city of Zaporizhia is part of the territories Moscow considers Russian, even if Moscow claims the nuclear plant.

Dmytro Sirchenko, who also came to help liberate the building destroyed by rubble, does not understand why the bombing happened in the middle of the city.

“I could logically explain if they hit military bases or something like that. But they hit the center of the city, where there is no military. “There is no infrastructure there. They only hit civilian buildings,” he said indignantly.

For him, however, there is no question of leaving. “Where to?” he asks. There is no safe place in Ukraine.