The numbers killed in the Hamas attacks in Israel continue to climb. What started in the hundreds has now passed 1,200. And is expected to go on climbing. It’s taking time for Israel to fully restore control over some of the communities invaded by Islamic terrorists. Identifying and counting the bodies has also become a long and grueling process. Some bodies were burned or badly mutilated.

The currently announced total is 22 Americans murdered in the attacks. This number will likely increase.

It is however the single deadliest death toll for Americans from Islamic terrorism since the Pulse Massacre in Florida in 2016. Beginning with 9/11, this would appear to be the third deadliest Islamic mass murder of American civilians in this century.

Hopefully the numbers don’t rise any further, but it’s possible they will.

At the moment, Israelis are still waiting on burying their dead. Bodies are still being turned up. Since Hamas Jihadis torched buildings to force families out into the open where they could kill them, it’s possible that some bodies may never be properly identified. Israeli rescue groups like ZAKA are expert at locating even small fragments of bone and tissue for burial and identification purpose, but there has never been anything on this scale in Israel. The closest parallel is 9/11 and it took a long time to identify the dead.