DPRK may be involved in preparations for Hamas attack on Israel - South Korea
North Korea is likely to be linked to the Hamas terrorist group in the arms trade and could have interacted with it on a number of military issues in the militants’ preparations for an attack on Israel.
This was reported by Yonhap with reference to a senior officer of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) of South Korea, Censor.NET reports.
The JCS experts came to this conclusion when assessing the unprecedented Hamas attacks on 7 October, during which they "blinded" Israel by paralysing its early warning system, fired more than 5,000 rockets and violated the Israeli border with paragliders.
The committee also analysed a video of armed Hamas militants and identified weapons that are produced only in the DPRK. These are high-explosive fragmentation rounds for the F-7 grenade launcher, a North Korean copy of the Soviet RPG-7, and 122mm artillery shells marked "Bang-122", which were used by the DPRK army to shell the South.
It is noted that this "with high probability" indicates that the DPRK continues to export various weapons to militants in the Middle East, although Pyongyang denies such accusations and calls them "groundless and false rumours".
The newspaper's sources also note that during the attack, Hamas militants used tactics to infiltrate Israel with the help of unconventional means, such as paragliders and drones, which the DPRK has used in the past to penetrate South Korea. Seoul's military does not rule out that the DPRK could have passed on the experience of using such tactics to Hamas.
In December 2016, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un personally participated in a presentation of paragliders capable of reaching the South Korean president's residence near Seoul.
The JCS added that it continues to analyse the war in the Middle East to identify signs of the DPRK's involvement in its preparation and to strengthen South Korea's defence capabilities.
