Russia has become stronger as a result of the conflict in Ukraine – just as it did by defeating Hitler and Napoleon, its foreign minister has claimed.

In a wide-ranging series of assertions, Sergei Lavrov said the “hybrid war” that the West is supposedly waging against Russia is based on “cancel culture”.

He also claimed that the West’s “500-year domination of the world” is coming to an end.

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Mr Lavrov – who is sanctioned by the UK and the EU – said the West was trying to exhaust Russia in Ukraine.

“It is up to the Ukrainians to recognise how deep they are in the hole where the Americans put them,” Mr Lavrov said of the war.

When asked what the chances were of diplomacy to bring about a ceasefire or peace, he said: “You’ll have to call Mr Zelenskyy because a year-and-a-half ago he signed a decree prohibiting any negotiations with Putin.”

He argued that Russia has become stronger due to the conflict in Ukraine, just as it became stronger by defeating Napoleon and Hitler in the past.

Moscow does not routinely release numbers of its casualties in the war, but Ukraine claims to have killed more than 338,000 Russian personnel since the start of the February 2022 invasion.

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Mr Lavrov also spoke about the Israel-Hamas conflict.

The foreign minister said it was not acceptable for Israel to use Hamas’s 7 October attacks as justification for the collective punishment of the Palestinian people, and called for international monitoring on the ground in Gaza.

He claimed that Russia has told Israel for many years that the single most dangerous factor in the Middle East is the unresolved status of Palestinian statehood.

Russia and the Israel-Hamas conflict

If a geopolitical crisis could come along at just the right moment for Russia, it is this terrible fresh iteration of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Many countries in the global south who Russia has been trying to convince that it is not the big bad wolf vis-a-vis Ukraine can now look at US support for Israel, at the expense of the appalling suffering of civilians in Gaza, and at the very least call out an almighty double standard.

Russia can look as though it is championing the underdog, condemning the killing in Gaza and pointing to its arch-enemy the US hegemon as flouting hopes for peace or a ceasefire – while conveniently brushing over the suffering it continues to subject the Ukrainian nation to.

The Russian public and other Arab states will agree.

Putin’s relations with Israel are suffering, as Netanyahu’s phone call today goes to show, but it is a price worth paying for Putin as he gears up for yet another electoral foregone conclusion.

Memories are short. Today’s crisis in the Middle East overshadows the ongoing bloodshed in Ukraine, Russia has time and resources on its side and it is steadily reclaiming its place on the global stage.

Zelenskyy in Argentina

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been in Argentina as he seeks to secure the support of countries in the global south.

His first trip to Latin America, he was due to attend the inauguration of new Argentine President Javier Milei.

Mr Zelenskyy hopes to convene a “global peace summit” and has promoted a peace plan rooted in the withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine and recognition of its post-Soviet borders of 1991.