BEIRUT, Dec 21 — An Israeli strike killed an elderly woman and wounded her husband in their home in southern Lebanon early today, Lebanon’s state news agency and a security source said.

Israel’s military said the air force had carried out retaliatory strikes on Hezbollah targets, including a site from which the group launched an attack on Wednesday night, and that Israel had shelled several launch sites in southern Lebanon.

The woman’s death brought the civilian death toll from Israeli fire on southern Lebanon in recent weeks to about 20, including journalists and children, according to a Reuters count.

Another Israeli strike overnight killed a member of Hezbollah, according to the armed group, which has lost more than 100 fighters in the recent hostilities with Israel.

Hezbollah has been trading fire with Israel at the border since Palestinian ally Hamas attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, igniting a conflict that has drawn in the heavily armed group and other Iran-aligned factions across the Middle East.

Israel says eight Israeli soldiers and four civilians have been killed on Israel’s side of the Lebanese border.

The violence has largely been contained to areas at the Israel-Lebanon border although some Israeli shelling has struck deeper, including an overnight strike that hit a location near Iqlim al-Tuffah, more than 30 km (19 miles) into Lebanese territory, a second security source in the area said.

Unwritten rules of engagement between Hezbollah and Israel, which fought a month-long war in 2006, appear to be shaping the exchanges of fire.

A source familiar with Hezbollah thinking said those rules meant that if Israel struck deeper into Lebanese territory, Hezbollah would strike deeper into Israel "and that’s where the matter stops.” The assessment was echoed by two other sources. — Reuters