Welcome back to World Brief: Holiday Edition. As a reminder, today’s newsletter will be an extended version, with special attention to tomorrow’s most impactful trends. World Brief will take a break for the rest of the week.

Now, we’re looking at U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement of a U.S. strike on a dock facility in Venezuela, potential U.S. security guarantees for Ukraine, and the United States’ small humanitarian aid pledge to the United Nations.

Welcome back to World Brief: Holiday Edition. As a reminder, today’s newsletter will be an extended version, with special attention to tomorrow’s most impactful trends. World Brief will take a break for the rest of the week.

Now, we’re looking at U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement of a U.S. strike on a dock facility in Venezuela, potential U.S. security guarantees for Ukraine, and the United States’ small humanitarian aid pledge to the United Nations.

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U.S. President Donald Trump listens during a press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (not pictured) at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, on Dec. 28.Joe Raedle/Getty Images

U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed on Monday that U.S. forces had hit and destroyed a dock facility in Venezuela last week that he said was used by alleged drug traffickers.

“There was a major explosion in the dock area where they load the boats up with drugs,” Trump said at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. “We hit all the boats, and now we hit the area—it’s the implementation area. … And that is no longer around.”

Such an attack marks the first known land strike on Venezuela since the White House began its pressure campaign against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in September. Details of the operation remain hazy, as Trump refused to comment on potential CIA involvement or give specifics regarding the strike’s exact location.

Trump authorized the CIA to begin planning covert operations inside Venezuela months ago, according to sources familiar with the plans. The ongoing campaign, which the White House has said is aimed at tackling narcotrafficking in Latin America, was reportedly developed to be conducted in two parts—with the second being direct strikes.

Over nearly four months, the U.S. military has launched more than 25 attacks on suspected drug-trafficking vessels in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, killing more than 100 people and eliciting accusations of war crimes.

Alongside a massive military buildup in the region, the designation of Venezuela’s Cartel de los Soles as a foreign terrorist organization, and a “

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