Photo: EPA

Russia has handed over to Hamas, a terrorist group that launched a large-scale attack against Israel on Saturday, Western weapons seized in Ukraine in order to accuse Kyiv of ‘selling Western equipment’, Ukraine’s defence intelligence, or GUR, said in a statement.

Fierce fighting—which Israeli intelligence had been unaware of planning—has been going on for several days in the Middle Eastern country, with both sides reporting hundreds of casualties.

Russia’s special services are planning to accuse the Ukrainian military for allegedly "selling Western weapons to terrorists on a regular basis," GUR says.

In order to do so, the Kremlin could disseminate fakes through Western media as ‘exposés’ and ‘investigations’, Ukrainian defence intelligence believes.

It adds that, as part of the disinformation campaign, Russian intelligence services could use Ukrainian senior lieutenant Ruslan Syrovyi, who turned out to be a traitor and recently fled to Moscow.

The provocation is aimed at discrediting the Ukrainian Armed Forces and "completely stopping military assistance to our country from Western partners," GUR concludes.