Israeli police raises toll of people killed in music festival on Oct 7

Jerusalem, Nov 18

Israeli police have raised the number of people killed at the Nova music festival by Hamas militants on October 7 to at least 364, up from the previous figure of 270.

In its bulletin on Friday night, Israel’s Channel 12 News said it had obtained a copy of the first police report into the attack and also presented some of the findings, CNN reported.

But the bulletin did not show a copy of the police report.

According to Channel 12 News, 17 of the victims were police officers and 40 festival attendees were kidnapped by the Hamas and taken to Gaza.

The music festival is the site of the highest number of deaths on October 7.

The police however, said following the interrogations of some of the captured militants, it came to the fore that the Hamas might have not known of the festival at all when it launched the attacks.

The police report also said that the first alarm was received at 6.22 a.m., but it is clear first responders had no idea of the scale of what was unfolding, CNN quoted Channel 12 News as saying.

It also said that initial word of the attack suggested just dozens of terrorists had crossed the perimeter fence from Gaza, but the real number is believed to be more than a thousand.

The police report further said that Israeli security forces finally had the festival site locked down at 3:30 p.m., more than nine hours after the shooting rampage began, .

It however remained unclear if the updated number of people killed at the festival affects the total death toll, which officials have said is more than 1,200.