Israel lowers its official Oct 7 death toll to 1,200

Israel revised its estimated official death toll of the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks, lowering the number to about 1,200 people, down from more than 1,400, a spokesperson for the Israeli Foreign Ministry said Friday night.

The spokesperson, Lior Haiat, said the original figure had been an "initial estimate" that had now been updated. He declined to provide further details on the change.

For weeks, Israeli officials had said that more than 1,400 people were killed in the attacks launched from Gaza, in which Hamas-led gunmen swept into more than 20 Israeli towns and military bases and opened fire on people in their homes, on the streets, at a music festival and at other locations. Others were killed when the attackers set their cars and homes on fire.

Israeli health officials say they have struggled to identify many Israelis and foreigners who were killed in the attacks, and to exclude the remains of those they considered to have been attackers from the official toll.

Some of the people killed were burned alive or their bodies were otherwise mutilated, requiring extensive testing to establish their identities, according to officials at Israel's main forensic institute.

Israel's original official toll from the attacks had not come under the level of scrutiny that the United States has applied to the death toll compiled by the authorities in the Gaza Strip, where thousands have died in weeks of heavy Israeli bombardment and a ground invasion.

The health ministry in the Gaza Strip, which Hamas controls, has said that more than 11,000 people have been killed since the war began last month, including more than 4,500 children.

The Gaza death toll has been subject to debate among U.S. and Israeli officials. Some, including US President Joe Biden, have cast doubt on the figures of health officials in Gaza, given Hamas' control over the territory.

But in recent days, several top officials in the Biden administration have acknowledged that thousands of Palestinian civilians have been killed since Israel's bombardment of Gaza began. They have declined to offer their own estimates, saying they are unable to verify the data provided by Gaza's health ministry.

On Tuesday, the US national security spokesperson, John Kirby, told reporters, "There have been many thousands killed," and on Wednesday, Barbara Leaf, assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, told a House committee that the civilian death toll in Gaza could be even higher than the numbers that Gaza's authorities have released.

The United Nations, rights groups and aid organizations have continued to cite the ministry, while also saying that they cannot independently confirm its figures. But they say the ministry's death tolls have been found to be consistent with their own investigations after past conflicts, and a US State Department report this year cited the ministry's figures.