The Palestinian Civil Defence said on Wednesday that at least 12 people were killed when a seven-storey residential building collapsed overnight in Gaza City.
Five of the dead were children, and 14 others were injured, the rescue service said. The building stood in the Tal al-Hawa area, where locals said 10 families had been living in the apartments despite warnings they were unsafe.
Footage verified by Al Jazeera showed rescue teams pulling children from the wreckage while residents dug by hand. One video captured a young girl pulled alive from the rubble and several survivors emerging breathless before being taken away by ambulance.
“Civil defence teams are still working to recover martyrs from under the rubble and search for missing people,” said Mahmoud Basal, a Gaza civil defence spokesperson. He estimated that nearly 100 Palestinians remained under the rubble.
Rescuers said they had initially worked with “empty hands” because of Israeli restrictions on equipment entering Gaza, before being able to borrow some heavy machinery. The shortage of equipment has left crews relying largely on manual labour, slowing response times in similar collapses.
The building had been struck in earlier Israeli bombing, which left it cracked and structurally unsound before it collapsed. Thousands of buildings across Gaza have been damaged during the war, and construction materials needed for repairs have been restricted from entering the territory.
Basal said many Palestinians are forced to stay in dangerous buildings because they have nowhere else to go in the absence of refugee centres or suitable tents.
The collapse came a day after Israeli air strikes killed at least five Palestinians in Gaza, including two children and a Hamas commander, according to health officials and Hamas sources. The Israeli military said it had killed a Hamas commander in southern Gaza and another fighter in the north.