Fourteen bodies have been recovered, including five children, while 12 people have been pulled alive from the debris, rescuers said.
The children and other displaced Palestinians had been sheltering inside the building, which had previously been partially damaged by attacks by the Israeli regime.
The building gave way at about 1 a.m. while residents were sleeping, leaving families buried beneath the rubble and rescue teams searching for survivors with limited equipment.
The scale of the toll on children across Gaza is far greater, with UNICEF reporting that at least 21,700 Palestinian children had been killed in Israeli genocidal war between October 2023 and February 2026, while 45,000 children had been injured.
Save the Children, citing figures from Gaza’s Government Media Office, reported in September 2025 that more than 20,000 children had been killed, with thousands more missing or believed to be buried under rubble.
Meanwhile, Gaza’s government media office blamed the Israeli regime for the deaths and said women and children remained among those buried under the debris.
“We hold the occupation and the international community fully responsible,” the statement read.
The office said the incident had further exacerbated the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, where about 8,500 people remain missing beneath the rubble of collapsed buildings and thousands continue to live in weakened structures.
“We call upon all countries of the world and international and UN organizations to intervene immediately to lift the unjust siege on the Gaza Strip, open all crossings, and allow the immediate entry of rescue and civil defence equipment and supplies, in addition to all the urgent and essential humanitarian and relief needs of the Gaza Strip,” the statement concluded.