Israeli warplanes hit the Gaza Strip's ruling Hamas movement early Monday in response to earlier rocket fire from the territory into Israel, the army said in a statement.

Israeli authorities also announced a punitive reduction in the flow of fuel to the strip's main power station, meaning a deep cut in the already rationed electricity supply.

Three rockets were fired from Gaza into southern Israel on Sunday night, the Israeli army said.

"Three launches were identified from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory," it said in a statement. "Two of them were intercepted by the Iron Dome aerial defence system."

"In response, a short while ago, (Israeli air force) fighter jets struck a number of terror targets in a Hamas military compound in the northern Gaza Strip, including the office of a Hamas battalion commander," a statement Monday morning added.

A Palestinian security source said there were no casualties.

A separate statement from Israeli defence ministry unit COGAT said the latest fuel cut was personally ordered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is also defence minister.

"The prime minister and minister of defence, Benjamin Netanyahu, ordered to downsize the transfer of fuel through the Kerem Shalom (border) crossing to the power station in Gaza by half, effective this morning and until further notice," it said in English.

Netanyahu is fighting for reelection in a potentially tough general election on September 17 with critics from his right-wing power base calling for tougher action against the Islamist Hamas.

Nevertheless, analysts say, he is anxious to avoid escalation ahead of the polls.

Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza have fought three wars since 2008.

Since the start of August, an uptick in rocket fire and Palestinian attempts to cross from Gaza into Israel have been met with Israeli strikes, threatening a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

Israel has also used fishing restrictions and fuel supplies as weapons, harshening and easing restrictions on the blockaded coastal strip according to circumstances.

Fuel deliveries, which are coordinated with the United Nations and paid for by Gulf state Qatar, were part of the truce agreement.

They have improved electricity supply in the enclave, where until the latest cut residents were getting around 12 hours of power a day, according to the UN.

In the past, the daily power supply was regularly as low as six hours.

Israeli strikes hit pro-Syria Palestinian group in Lebanon
Beirut (AFP) Aug 26, 2019 - Israeli air strikes targeted a Palestinian faction loyal to the Syrian government in eastern Lebanon before dawn on Monday, Lebanese state media and the group said.

The strikes came just hours after the head of Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah threatened Israel after two drones fell on its Beirut stronghold in what he described as a targeted "drone attack".

The National News Agency said "three hostile strikes" after midnight hit Lebanon's eastern mountains near Qusaya town "where the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command has military posts".

"They responded will a barrage of anti-aircraft fire," it said.

PFLP-GC spokesman Anwar Raja told the Al-Mayadeen television channel that it was an Israeli strike.

The PFLP-GC has close ties to Hezbollah and the Syria's government.

It has positions in the eastern region of Bekaa, as well as in Al-Naaemeh just south of Beirut.

Qusaya is only about five kilometres (three miles) from the Syrian border.

In July 2015, a security official said a blast at a PFLP-GC base there wounded seven people, while the Palestinian group blamed it on an Israeli strike.

On Sunday, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah threatened Israel after what he described as a targeted "drone attack" in a stronghold of his group in the south of Beirut.

"The time when Israeli aircraft come and bombard parts of Lebanon is over," he said.

"I say to the Israeli army along the border, from tonight be ready and wait for us," he said. "What happened yesterday will not pass."

Hezbollah, considered a terrorist organisation by Israel and the United States, is a major political actor in Lebanon and also a key government backer in war-torn Syria.

The latest incident also came after Israel on Saturday launched strikes in neighbouring Syria to prevent what it said was an Iranian attack on the Jewish state.

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