The Israeli military shelled sites in southern Lebanon in retaliation to rockets being fired towards northern Israel for the third day in a row on Tuesday, while fighting raged in southern Israel in the wake of a significant strike carried out by the Palestinian Hamas terror group in the Gaza Strip.

According to the Israel Defense Forces, 15 rockets were fired at the Western Galilee from Lebanon, activating sirens in a number of villages.

The Iron Dome air defense system was able to stop four rockets, and the remaining eight landed in open spaces without inflicting any harm or injuries, according to the IDF.

The military initially claimed in a statement that it had responded to the rocket attack with artillery strikes, but in a later statement, it claimed that tanks had bombarded two targets.

A short while later, an anti-tank guided missile was launched from Lebanon at an armored vehicle near the northern town of Avivim, the IDF said. No soldiers were wounded.

The military said a combat helicopter struck a third Hezbollah post in response to that attack.

“The IDF is prepared for all scenarios and will continue to protect the residents of the State of Israel,” the military said in a statement.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the rocket fire or the ATGM attack.

The attacks came a day after Israeli forces clashed with terrorists on the Lebanon border. The clashes left three Israeli soldiers and two Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorists dead.

Three Hezbollah members were killed in Israel’s retaliatory bombing against the terror group’s sites.

Tuesday’s rocket fire came following the funerals of two of the slain Hezbollah members.

Both before and after Monday’s clashes, several mortar shells were fired at Israel from southern Lebanon. The IDF responded to those attacks with artillery fire.

On Sunday morning, Hezbollah launched dozens of rockets at three Israeli positions in the contested Mount Dov region, causing damage but no injuries.

Hezbollah claimed to have fired the rockets in solidarity with the Hamas attack in southern Israel.

Hezbollah has largely sat out previous rounds of fighting between Israel and Palestinian terror groups, though it allowed local Palestinian factions to operate out of its territory in southern Lebanon.

But some fear the Lebanon-based terror group will open up a second front amid the war triggered by Saturday’s unprecedented invasion of Israel by hundreds of Hamas terrorists from the Gaza Strip.

Tuesday’s rocket fire from Lebanon came as hundreds of rockets continued to be launched from the Gaza Strip at southern and central Israel.

On Saturday morning, Palestinian terrorists rampaged through the south of the country, killing nearly 1,000 people, injuring over 2,500, and taking at least 100 captives to Gaza.

Source: The Times of Israel