IDF believes 3,000 Hamas terrorists invaded Israel in initial Oct. 7 assault

Emanuel (Mannie) Fabian is The Times of Israel's military correspondent

Gazans celebrate by a destroyed Israeli tank at the broken Israel-Gaza border fence, east of Khan Younis, October 7, 2023. (AP/Yousef Masoud)
Gazans celebrate by a destroyed Israeli tank at the broken Israel-Gaza border fence, east of Khan Younis, October 7, 2023. (AP/Yousef Masoud)

A new IDF assessment of Hamas’s October 7 massacre suggests that around 3,000 terrorists invaded southern Israel to carry out a murderous rampage through Gaza border towns, The Times of Israel has learned.

Previously, the military had estimated that some 2,500 terrorist operatives took part.

According to the latest assessment, the figure only includes armed terror operatives and not the waves of Gazan citizens who took advantage of the enormous gaps in the fence to also make their way inside later in the day.

The IDF has said that during the first two days of fighting its forces killed around 1,000 terrorists and captured 200, and that there are many bodies of terrorists still scattered around the border area, and it intends to collect them when possible without endangering soldiers’ lives.

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