Two of the most senior Christian leaders in Jerusalem travelled to Gaza on Friday after Israeli fire killed three at the Palestinian territory's only Catholic church, provoking international condemnation.

The rare visit came after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel "deeply regrets" the strike on the Holy Family Church in Gaza City and blamed a "stray" round.

Israel strictly controls access to the territory, where the civil defence agency on Friday reported that further Israeli strikes killed at least 25 Palestinians, including a family of five in their own home.

Local people used their bare hands to pick through the debris in the southern city of Khan Yunis in a desperate search for survivors.

"Entire families are buried under the rubble," Louai Abu Sahloul, a relative of the victims, told AFP, adding that the relentless wave of strikes was taking its toll.

"People are like walking dead, tired of hunger, pain and destruction everywhere in Gaza," he said.

The Catholic Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Pierbattista Pizzaballa, and his Greek Orthodox counterpart, Theophilos III, headed to Gaza and met local Christians following Thursday's strike.

They........

© International Business Times