Hamas is allied with Lebanon's Iran-backed Shiite group Hezbollah (File)
Hamas operatives on Monday fired 16 rockets from Lebanon towards northern Israel, the Palestinian group's armed wing announced, saying they targeted areas south of the Israeli coastal city of Haifa.
The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades said the strikes came "in response to the occupation's (Israel's) massacres and its aggression against our people in the Gaza Strip".
The Israeli army meanwhile reported about 30 projectiles had been fired at northern Israel from Lebanon, adding that it fired back at the direction they had been launched from.
It came after the health ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip announced earlier Monday that the death count in the enclave had surpassed 10,000 nearly a month after the start of the war triggered by the Hamas group's unprecedented attack on Israel.
Israeli officials say more than 1,400 people, most of them civilians, have been killed in Israel since the October 7 attack, during which Hamas took more than 240 people hostage.
Hamas, which is allied with Lebanon's Iran-backed Shiite group Hezbollah, has a number of fighters in south Lebanon and has previously claimed attacks on Israel from there.
Tensions have run high at the border between Israel and Lebanon -- which remain technically at war -- since the October 7 attack, with Hezbollah and Israel regularly exchanging attacks.
Since October 7, at least 81 people have been killed on the Lebanese side in cross-border skirmishes, according to an AFP tally, including 59 Hezbollah fighters.
Six soldiers and two civilians have been killed on the Israeli side.
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