Gaza’s civil defence agency has said an Israeli air strike in the early hours of Saturday killed 15 people from a Palestinian family, including nine children and three women, AFP reports.

The strike hit the home of the Ajlah family in Al Zawaida neighbourhood of central Gaza, civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP. The Israeli military did not offer an immediate comment.

“The toll from the Israeli strike on the Ajlah family home and their warehouse in Al-Zawaida is 15 dead,” Bassal said. He gave a list of those killed, including nine children and three women.

A witness said the strike took place shortly after midnight. “Three rockets hit the house directly,” Ahmed Abu al-Ghoul told AFP as rescuers pulled bodies from the rubble of the flattened house.

“There were a lot of children and women inside… What have they done to deserve this?” AFPTV footage of the aftermath, captured after dawn, showed rescuers searching for bodies under piles of collapsed concrete blocks.