Israeli warplanes and troopshave attacked the outskirts of a south Lebanon village on Sunday afterHizbollah guerrillas fired an anti-aircraft shell that killed anIsraeli, witnesses and Hizbollah television said.
"Zionist planes attacked the outskirts of the village ofTair Harfa in south Lebanon," al-Manar television said in a newsflash. The station later reported a second strike in the nearbyTellat al-Kharba area.
Witnesses told journalists they heard the sound of severalexplosions in the area and that Israeli troops had also shotfive shells from a disputed border zone into the outskirts ofthe southern Kfar Shouba town, prompting residents to flee theirhomes in fear.
They said Israeli planes and helicopters had been flyingover south Lebanon all morning and continued their overflightsinto Lebanese territory after the air strikes.
The death was the first in northern Israel by Hizbollah firesince Israeli forces withdrew from south Lebanon in 2000 after a22-year occupation.
Hizbollah was the driving force in helping push Israel fromsouth Lebanon. The two sides have clashed sporadically since thepullout, and Hizbollah often fires anti-aircraft rounds atIsraeli jets over Lebanon.
A spokesman for the United Nations peacekeeping force UNIFILsaid he was investigating the exchange of fire from both sidesof the border.
Tension has increased between Israel and the Shi'ite Muslimguerrilla group since Hizbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallahthreatened late last month to kidnap more Israelis unless therewas a breakthrough in stalled prisoner swap talks.
Hizbollah seized three Israeli soldiers in a disputed borderarea in the foothills of the Golan Heights in October 2000.
Afew weeks later, it said it had captured reserve officer ElhananTenenbaum, who it said was a Mossad agent.
Hizbollah has long campaigned for the release of about 15Lebanese detainees in Israeli jails and has negotiatedsporadically with German mediation over a possible prisonerexchange, but the talks stalled.
A week after Nasrallah's threat, a powerful car bomb killeda Hizbollah member in an attack blamed on the Jewish state.
Hizbollah called the dead man, Ali Hussein Saleh, one of its"holy warriors" and said the killing would not go unpunished.
Hizbollah responded days later by attacking Israeli armyposts at the disputed Shebaa Farms border area, shattering sevenmonths of relative calm along the border and prompting Israel toopen fire on the edges of nearby Lebanese border villages.Hizbollah said more attacks could be on the way.