In a statement Monday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz announced that the IDF had eliminated 4,000 out of 6,000 terrorists who had participated in the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, constituting two-thirds of the total, and he vowed that Israel would finish the job.

“4,000 terrorists who infiltrated Israel on October 7 have been eliminated — 2,000 remain,” he wrote.

“Prime Minister Netanyahu and I ordered the IDF to pursue and eliminate them all — from the top brass to the rank and file,” he added.

“This is the command of the murdered and the fallen, and this is our duty as a people and a state — and we will fulfill it,” he vowed.

Despite the ceasefire, the IDF has been picking off Oct. 7 terrorists, claiming they posed an active threat to allow it to conduct the strikes, taking down 17 in September alone.

To that end, the IDF and Shin Bet established a special operation conducted by a unit called Nili to hunt down and eliminate every single terrorist who participated in the Oct. 7 attack, abused hostages, held hostages in captivity or participated in the hostage release ceremonies. Hamas leaders who orchestrated the attack were also included on the list.

Nili has achieved stunning successes so far, as evinced by Katz’s announcement that 4,000 out of 6,000 terrorists had been eliminated. Nili operatives, who comprise Shin Bet officials and IDF soldiers and reservists, use footage from Hamas GoPro cameras, facial recognition software, online video and photographic evidence, artificial intelligence and traditional tools to collect information on the ground, members of the Nili unit told Channel 12 News in their first open acknowledgment of the special operation.

Finding and locating the terrorists meant sifting through thousands of documents and other pieces of evidence, “an endless pile of material,” as described by Adi Rotem, a former senior official with the Shin Bet.

The terrorists who kidnapped Yaffa Adar, 85; Yagil Yaakov, 12; Yarden Bibas; and Avinatan Or, as well as the terrorist who drove his tractor through the border fence, have all been eliminated.

“It could be the driver who drove a tractor [across the border], and it could be a Nukhba company commander who led the invasion,” said Lammed, a Nili operative who is also a lieutenant in the IDF’s Southern Command.

“You feel the tension [during a mission to eliminate terrorists],” she added. “You feel the quiet, the seconds before the missile hits; everyone is just waiting for the strike to hit the person.”

Lammed described the mission targeting a platoon commander who led the invasion of the Nahal Oz IDF base.

“We knew what time he went to the shop, we knew the path he took; this is the task of intelligence, to take every target of interest to us, and investigate him down to the smallest detail, to the level of when he goes to pray, and what he eats for breakfast,” she explained.

The IDF estimates that 1,200 to 1,600 were killed inside Israel during the attack. Another 300 were captured and await justice in Israeli prisons, while the remainder fled back to the Gaza Strip, where about 2,400 were killed in the ensuing fighting or were targeted by Israel.