100 killed in deadly Israeli strike in Gaza

Lebanon says 60 killed in Bekaa Valley attack

GAZA CITY/ BEIRUT:

An Israeli air strike on a single residential block killed nearly 100 people on Tuesday, Gaza's civil defence agency said, leaving rescuers scrambling for survivors as Israel pursued its offensives in Gaza and Lebanon.

Israel's key ally and backer the United States called the strike -- which killed a large number of children -- "horrifying".

The bombing came with Israel facing an international backlash after its parliament voted overwhelmingly to ban UNRWA, the main United Nations aid agency working with Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

Palestinian rescuers and desperate family members gathered around the demolished five-storey block in Beit Lahia in northern Gaza.

A charred body with long hair hung from an upper-storey window and bodies in blankets were lined up in the street as stunned relatives sought to identify loved ones.

"The number of martyrs in the massacre of the Abu Nasr family home in Beit Lahia has risen to 93 martyrs, and about 40 are still missing under the rubble," Gaza civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.

"The explosion happened at night and I first thought it was shelling, but when I went out after sunrise I saw people pulling bodies, limbs and the wounded from under the rubble," said Rabie al-Shandagly, 30.

"Most of the victims are women and children, and people are trying to save the injured, but there are no hospitals or proper medical care," he told AFP.

Washington expressed deep concern. "This was a horrifying incident with a horrifying result," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters.

"We have reached out to the government of Israel to ask what happened here."

International concerns mounted after the Israeli parliament voted overwhelmingly to ban UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees. Lawmakers also passed a measure prohibiting Israeli officials from working with UNRWA.

In Lebanon, Israeli tanks entered the outskirts of the village of Khiam, their deepest incursion yet in the ground operation they launched against Hezbollah last month, state media reported.

Later Tuesday, the health ministry reported at least five dead in an Israeli strike on Haret Saida near the main southern city of Sidon.

Separately, the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, UNIFIL, said its southern Lebanon headquarters had been hit by a rocket fired "likely by Hezbollah or an affiliated group". Austria said eight of its soldiers were hurt.

According to an AFP tally based on official figures, at least 1,700 people have been killed in Lebanon since September 23.

Lebanon's health ministry said at least 60 people were killed on Monday in Israeli raids on several areas in the eastern Bekaa Valley, most of them in the Baalbek region.

The health ministry said the tolls covered 12 areas in the Bekaa Valley where militant group Hezbollah holds sway. At least two children were among the dead, it said.

At least 58 others were wounded, the health ministry added, noting that the toll was preliminary as rescue efforts were still underway.

Of the 60 killed, at least 16 deaths were recorded in Al-Alaq, west of Baalbek city, according to the health ministry.