Palestinian Rocket Hits Israeli Dwelling

Three People, Including Infant, Are Injured

A 7-month-old is rushed into a hospital after a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip struck a home in the Negev region. Israel responded with artillery fire. (By Shay Shmueli -- Reuters)

JERUSALEM, Feb. 3 -- At least three members of an Israeli family, including a 7-month-old infant, were wounded Friday when a rocket fired by Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip struck their mobile home in the Negev region of southern Israel.

Two more missiles struck an industrial park in the Israeli city of Ashkelon, damaging part of a desalination complex. The Israeli military responded with artillery fire into northern Gaza, where many recent rocket attacks have originated.

Since Israel's withdrawal from Gaza last year, radical Palestinian groups have frequently fired homemade missiles into southern Israel. Few have hit targets, although a government ombudsman issued a report recently that criticized the military for responding slowly to protect Israeli communities in the area.

The Israeli military has designated a portion of northern Gaza as a no-go zone for Palestinians, but the rocket fire has continued. The radical Islamic Jihad movement, whose leader in the West Bank city of Jenin was killed by Israeli troops this week, has asserted responsibility for many of the attacks.

"The Palestinian Authority continues to refrain from taking the necessary steps to prevent such launchings, thus resulting in the injury of Israelis in their home on Sabbath eve," said David Baker, a spokesman for acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. "The Palestinian Authority is responsible for what goes on in territories under its control, and it will not be able to shirk its responsibilities."

Hours before the rocket strike in the Negev, the radical Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah attacked an Israeli army post in the Shebaa Farms area along the Lebanon-Israel border. One soldier was slightly wounded in the mortar attack, and Israeli forces retaliated with artillery fire and airstrikes on Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon.

Israel occupied the Shebaa Farms area in the 1967 Middle East war. Hezbollah claims the roughly 100-square-mile region, including military buffer zones, as Lebanese territory. But the United Nations considers the land part of Syria.