Did North Korea Give Hamas Weapons?

That's what they're saying:

Thousands of information technology workers contracting with U.S. companies have for years secretly sent millions of dollars of their wages to North Korea for use in its ballistic missile program, FBI and Department of Justice officials said.

The Justice Department said Wednesday that IT workers dispatched and contracted by North Korea to work remotely with companies in St. Louis and elsewhere in the U.S. have been using false identities to get the jobs. The money they earned was funneled to the North Korean weapons program, FBI leaders said at a news conference in St. Louis.

Federal authorities announced the seizure of $1.5 million and 17 domain names as part of the investigation, which is ongoing.

Jay Greenberg, special agent in charge of the St. Louis FBI office, said any company that hired freelance IT workers “more than likely” hired someone participating in the scheme. An FBI spokeswoman said Thursday that the North Koreans contracted with companies across the U.S. and in some other countries.

“We can tell you that there are thousands of North Korea IT workers that are part of this,” spokeswoman Rebecca Wu said.

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South Korean officials, two experts on North Korean arms and an Associated Press analysis of weapons captured on the battlefield by Israel point toward Hamas using Pyongyang’s F-7 rocket-propelled grenade, a shoulder-fired weapon that fighters typically use against armored vehicles.

The evidence shines a light on the murky world of the illicit arms shipments that sanction-battered North Korea uses as a way to fund its own conventional and nuclear weapons programs.

Rocket-propelled grenade launchers fire a single warhead and can be quickly reloaded, making them valuable weapons for guerrilla forces in running skirmishes with heavy vehicles. The F-7 has been documented in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, said N.R. Jenzen-Jones, a weapons expert who works as the director of the consultancy Armament Research Services.

“North Korea has long supported Palestinian militant groups, and North Korean arms have previously been documented amongst interdicted supplies,” Jenzen-Jones told the AP.

First of all, American sanctions on North Korea should be preventing the use of North Korean labour domestically and internationally, something most countries deliberately fail at.

Secondly, all North Korean labour results in remittance of wages. 

Thirdly, North Korea may not be the only player in this:

North Korea sent more than 1,000 containers worth of arms to Russia last month, the U.S. has revealed. American satellite photos show that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un shipped the containers from Rajin port even before he went to Vladivostok last month, and they were then transported by train to a location 290 km from the border with Ukraine. The North was no doubt promised reciprocal rewards. 

In a Workers Party meeting in 2021, Kim announced five major weapons development goals -- hypersonic missiles, large nuclear warheads, nuclear-powered submarines, and intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of carrying multiple warheads. Experts believe the North wants technology from Russia to be used in these projects. North Korea failed twice this year in launching a spy satellite, and the it cannot be ruled out that Moscow will provide Pyongyang with the technology to develop cutting-edge fighter jets and high-tech reconnaissance equipment.

Just what we need - actual Russian interference.

North Korea will do anything to stay afloat, even trade weapons.

Thanks to poor application of sanctions and weakened Western governments, North Korea can continue supplying Hamas and other parties with weapons, thereby prolonging already grim conflicts.