The United States has cut supplies of artillery shells by a third after the conflict in the Middle East escalated. This was reported by the ABC television channel with reference to an unnamed Ukrainian official.
According to ABC, shipments of US NATO-standard artillery shells to Ukraine have dropped “by more than 30 per cent” since Israel’s conflict against Hamas in the Gaza Strip began last month.
The channel’s source said the stockpile of 155mm artillery shells represented “about 60 to 70 per cent of the total supply” to the Ukrainian army. According to the ABC interlocutor, US officials assured Kiev that the arms transfer to Israel would not affect US commitments to Ukraine, “but it did.”
At the same time, a senior Pentagon official told the TV channel that the reduction in ammunition supplies “has absolutely nothing to do with what is happening in the Gaza Strip”.
Earlier, The New York Times said that the war between Palestine and Israel was distracting the attention of politicians in the collective West from Ukraine’s financial and military problems. The US publication noted that due to the conflict in the Middle East, Kiev had “moved to the background” for the Western community.