An Israeli air strike killed three Palestinians, including a 17-year-old boy, in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday shortly after two rockets were fired into Israel from the area, Palestinian doctors said.
According to Reuters, the Israeli army said it had targeted activists who had launched the rockets. They had hit the port city of Ashkelon and one Israeli was lightly injured by a rocket, police said.
The Palestinian doctors said the three people killed in the air strike were civilians and that one activist and two other civilians were injured. A spokesman for Islamic Jihad confirmed the group had fired rockets at the town.
A relative of the victims told the AP a group of Palestinian fighters had set up a rocket launcher near an agricultural college, but area residents told them to leave. As they were leaving, a tank shell hit the area.
