Americans were horrified last month after the Iranian-backed terror group Hamas murdered 1,400 people in an attack on Israel.

Yet in a shocking revelation, FBI Director Christopher Wray recently confirmed that members of similar groups are already in the United States.

Texas Republican asks about terror watch list

According to Breitbart, that acknowledgment came on Wednesday during a meeting of the House Homeland Security Committee.

At one point during the hearing Texas Republican Rep. August Pfluger inquired about whether terrorists are crossing the southern border.

FBI Director Christopher Wray ADMITS that there are known and suspected terrorists who entered the southern border illegally and the FBI doesn't know where they are. pic.twitter.com/b1SVfo7H09

— Rep. August Pfluger (@RepPfluger) November 15, 2023

"Are there people that you are still searching for that we don’t know where they are in the United States?" the Republican lawmaker began.

Encounters with suspected terrorists have risen exponentially

"Of the known apprehensions … known or suspected terror people who match the Terror Watch List? Are you still searching for people in the United States who you know match the Terror Watch List?" he asked.

Wray replied that "there are certainly individuals who are the subject of terrorism investigations that we are searching for."

When the FBI director began to ramble, Pfluger again spoke up asking, "Are there people that you don’t where they are that the FBI is searching for today?" to which Wray admitted that there are.

Breitbart noted how Wray's comments came just one day after the Daily Caller reported that last month Border Patrol agents apprehended 13 individuals whose names appear on the federal terror watch list.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data shows that 172 of those on the terror watch list were encountered in fiscal year 2023, up from 98 in fiscal year 2022. By comparison, just a dozen such figures were caught by Border Patrol personnel between fiscal years 2018 and 2020.

CBP claims encounters with those on watch list are "very uncommon"

"Encounters of watchlisted individuals at our borders are very uncommon, underscoring the critical work CBP Agents and Officers carry out every day on the frontlines," a CBP statement declared.

"DHS works tirelessly to secure our borders through a combination of highly trained personnel, ground and aerial monitoring systems, and robust intelligence and information sharing networks," it continued.

The statement went on to stress that those on the watchlist "may be detained and removed, to the extent possible under CBP policy, or turned over to another government agency for subsequent detention or law enforcement action, as appropriate."