Reports say a crane fell on to the three-storey building, bringing it down.
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The building, which was under construction, sits in a commercial area in northern Tel Aviv, comprising of mainly high-tech businesses, restaurants and a hospital.
The Palestinian Authority’s Labor Minister Mamoun Abu Shahla said that the two people confirmed dead on Monday were Palestinians from the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Shoafat, the Haaretz daily reported. They were found under the rubble, he added.
To enter the site of Monday’s collapse, journalists and rescue workers must traverse three flights on a rickety and dust-covered staircase, supported by wooden beams. Search-and-rescue dogs were also at the scene.
“Reports came in of other people who were unaccounted for and likely still trapped inside”.
Israel’s military said search-and-rescue forces were called in to assist in the “rescue and extraction” of civilians from the structure.
A construction worker from the site said he was underground in the garage when he began to feel vibrations.
Police reported 18 wounded, including one seriously, one moderately and 16 lightly.
“All of a sudden everything collapsed”, survivor Micha Lavine, identified by media as a project manager at the site, said at the hospital.
Those two were later rescued, they said.
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the site late Monday night, eschewing the Federation Internationale de Football Association 2018 World Cup qualifying soccer match between Israel and Italy being held in Jerusalem.
