Palestinian mother and 4 children killed in Gaza carnage

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli fire hit a house in the Gaza Strip on Monday while a family was eating breakfast, killing six Palestinians, including four children and their mother, residents and medical workers said.

Israel challenged the account, describing the deaths as tragic and saying they occurred when an aircraft fired at two militants carrying bags filled with munitions that detonated and destroyed the home in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanoun.

Local residents said no militants were killed in the explosion.

"They have wiped out my family," said the children's father, Ahmed Abu Meateq, blaming Israeli forces and weeping as the bodies were prepared for burial.

The carnage cast another shadow over Egyptian efforts to forge a ceasefire between Israel and militant groups and end violence threatening U.S.-brokered Palestinian statehood talks.

"This aggression does not serve efforts being exerted to achieve calm, and it obstructs the peace process," Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, referring to Israel's military activities, said in a statement carried by WAFA news agency.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, without giving details of the raid in Beit Hanoun, said Hamas Islamists controlling the Gaza Strip bore overall responsibility for casualties among non-combatants because gunmen "operated among civilians".

The army said in a statement late on Monday it was probing the incident and would report its findings within 48 hours.