  The tidal disruption of a solar mass star around a supermassive black hole
has been extensively studied analytically and numerically. In these events the
star develops into an elongated banana-shaped structure. After completing an
eccentric orbit, the bound debris fall onto the black hole, forming an
accretion disk and emitting radiation. The same process may occur on planetary
scales, if a minor body orbits too close to its star. In the Solar System,
comets fall directly onto our Sun or onto planets. If the star is a compact
object, the minor body can become tidally disrupted. Indeed, one of the first
mechanisms invoked to produce strong gamma-ray emission involved accretion of
comets onto neutron stars in our Galaxy. Here we report that the peculiarities
of the `Christmas' gamma-ray burst (GRB 101225A) can be explained by a tidal
disruption event of a minor body around a Galactic isolated neutron star. This
result would indicate either that minor bodies can be captured by compact
stellar remnants more frequently than it occurs in our Solar System or that
minor body formation is relatively easy around millisecond radio pulsars. A
peculiar Supernova associated to a GRB may provide an alternative explanation.
