Top church leaders in the Holy Land headed into Gaza Friday for a rare solidarity visit one day after an Israeli shell slammed into the only Catholic church in the territory, killing three people.

The strike killed three people and injured several others, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which oversees the small parish, said Thursday.

Two women were killed and several people were injured following a strike which hit the Catholic parish in the Gaza Strip, doctors at the Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City said on Thursday.