Israeli intelligence identified the correct target — a three-story concrete house on the northern edge of Gaza City where top Hamas military men were holding a meeting. They included Muhammad Deif, chief of the military wing, sought by Israel for more than a decade, and Raed Saad, his top aide.

The Israeli Air Force hit the target accurately at 3 a.m., collapsing the back of the house into a concrete sandwich, while the front teetered backward, resting on the rubble behind.

But the top men of Hamas’s secretive military wing, the most important of the groups that have held a captured Israeli soldier since June 25, escaped, apparently injured, even after another Israeli missile was fired on a car fleeing the scene.

Instead, the bombing killed 9 members of the Salmiyeh family, a father, mother and 7 of the couple’s 10 children, ages 7 to 18, who were on the upper floors of the house.

It was another example of Israeli disregard for Palestinian life, in the views of neighbors and onlookers. From Israel’s point of view, the meeting was a perfectly justified target and another example of Hamas’s irresponsibility in putting civilian lives at risk.

The house’s owner, Nabil Abu Salmiyeh, 48, was a lecturer at Gaza City’s Islamic University and reported to be a member of Hamas, and he apparently allowed his house, in the quiet Sheik Radwan district, to be used for the meeting.

For Muhammad Zughbor, an accountant who lives across the street, it was a lucky escape for his own four children. He pointed out his daughters’ wrecked bedroom, which faces the street.

“It’s the first time in my life I remember them sleeping in our bedroom,” he said, still amazed, explaining that they wanted to be near a fan. None of the seven people in the house were hurt, only two of his pet birds on the roof.

Mr. Zughbor had no idea that Mr. Salmiyeh was so involved with Hamas, but was convinced that Mr. Deif must have been in the house for the Israelis to bomb it in such a crowded neighborhood. “It takes a political decision to bomb a house like this,” he said. When they were awakened by the blast, he said, neighbors ran into the street to try to help. His house filled with black smoke, and it was a while before anyone could see.

The eldest son, Muhammad Salmiyeh, was on the upper balcony, Mr. Zughbor remembered, screaming, “We’re still breathing, help us!” He also said he remembered seeing headless torsos and the body of a small child in the olive trees beside the house. One son, Awad, was dug out of the rubble four hours later, and underwent an operation at Al Shifa hospital here.

Dr. Jumaa al-Saqqa, a surgeon and hospital spokesman, said that 37 people had been wounded and that 3 of them were in critical condition. Asked about Hamas members who were said to have come to the hospital for treatment, he sighed and said, “Some came and were treated and left.” Asked for their names, he said: “They themselves refused to give us any information.”

At the funeral for the Salmiyeh family members, the dead were borne aloft by hundreds of mourners. There was the usual shooting of guns into the air and the fervent praise for the “shuhada,” the martyrs. There were the flags of all the militant groups: the green of Hamas, the yellow of Fatah, the black of Islamic Jihad, the red of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. As usual, there was not a Palestinian flag to be seen.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company