Jan. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Several rockets fired from Lebanon struck northern Israel early today, the first time the Jewish state’s conflict with Hamas in the Gaza Strip has spread elsewhere in the region.

The rockets hit western Galilee, in northern Israel, close to the border with Lebanon, slightly injuring two people and leaving several others needing treatment for shock, police said.

At least three rockets were fired from Lebanon, an army spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity. Israeli artillery bombarded southern Lebanon in response, Israel’s Channel 2 reported.

The attacks come a day after Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the Islamic Hezbollah militia, warned of “all possibilities” against Israel in reaction to the Gaza conflict. Israeli forces fought a monthlong war against Hezbollah in Lebanon in 2006.

Israel’s army ordered the residents of two towns to stay inside of protected rooms. Schools were also ordered to close in the towns of Shlomi and Nahariya, Colonel Yaron Bar-Dayan said on Channel 2.

“We had warnings that Hezbollah or other Islamic extremist groups might try a provocation in the north,” said Israeli Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit on Army Radio.

“Our reaction should be responsible and very carefully weighed,” in order to avoid unnecessarily opening a second front to the conflict in the south, Sheetrit said.

Cairo Talks

The attacks come as an Israeli delegation heads to Cairo today to discuss a French-Egyptian proposal that would end military operations against Hamas in Gaza, as the conflict entered its 13th day. Fighting resumed in Gaza late yesterday after a three-hour suspension of Israel’s offensive in order to allow humanitarian aid to reach the civilian population.

Air and artillery strikes hit 40 targets in Gaza, including rocket launching sites, bunkers and weapons storage areas, the army said in an e-mailed statement. Israel says the attacks are intended to halt rockets being fired from Gaza on its southern cities and towns.

The army is still not operating in the most densely populated regions, said an Israeli military official yesterday, speaking on condition of anonymity. Fiercer fighting is expected when troops enter urban areas.

At least 700 Palestinians have died in the conflict and 3,000 have been wounded, including 24 yesterday, said Mu’awia Hassanein, chief of emergency medical services in Gaza. United Nations officials say as many as one quarter are civilians.

Combat Deaths

Six Israeli soldiers have died in combat since ground forces entered Gaza on Jan. 3, following air operations that started on Dec. 27 against sites linked with Hamas, a militant Islamic group that seized power in the 40-kilometer (25-mile) long coastal territory in 2007.

At least 24 rockets from Gaza struck Israel yesterday, police said, injuring two people lightly, compared with 35 rockets the day before. That was down from a peak of 76 on the first day of the operation. Four civilians have been killed by rocket attacks since then. Israel says as many as 3,200 rockets and mortar shells were fired at the country last year.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said yesterday Israel accepted a truce plan presented by him and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Israel said, while the French-Egyptian proposal for a permanent cease-fire looked promising, more conditions must be met before an end to the conflict can be achieved.

“We have welcomed the Egyptian-French plan,” said government spokesman Mark Regev following a Cabinet meeting in which the proposal was discussed, “and we are working with them to make this a success.”

Arms Embargo

A truce would have to include an end to hostile fire into Israel from Gaza, and a “working arms embargo on Hamas that has support from the international community,” Regev said, including measures to end the smuggling of weapons and explosives through tunnels dug under the Gaza-Egypt border.

Amos Gilad, who heads the Defense Ministry’s diplomatic bureau, will travel to Cairo today to meet with Egyptian government officials, Haaretz said on its Web site. His talks are to prepare for negotiations on a cease-fire, the daily newspaper reported, without saying where it obtained the information.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is on his way to Cairo, Maged Abdelaziz, Egypt’s ambassador to the UN, said yesterday in New York.

Terrorist Organization

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, speaking at the UN, said he didn’t know whether Hamas is sending representatives to Cairo. Hamas, designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the European Union, seized control of Gaza in 2007 after a brief power-sharing arrangement with Abbas, who leads the Fatah movement.

Hamas refused to renew a six-month truce that expired on Dec. 19 because it said Israel hadn’t eased an economic blockade of Gaza begun after the group took control there.

The army late yesterday dropped leaflets in the southernmost Gaza neighborhood of Rafah along the Egyptian border, warning residents to evacuate for their own safety. Following aerial bombing of suspected tunnel sites in the area, Israeli forces entered Rafah and engaged in combat with Hamas gunmen, an army spokesman said.

Homes Destroyed

Ghazi Hamad, a Hamas spokesman who lives in Rafah, told reporters that Israeli forces were destroying dozens of residents’ homes in the area.

President-elect Barack Obama said in a Washington news conference yesterday he’s being “briefed daily” on the conflict in the Gaza Strip and will be ready to engage issues in the Middle East immediately after he takes office Jan. 20.

“Until I take office, it would be imprudent of me to start sending out signals that somehow we are running foreign policy when I’m not legally authorized to do so,” he said.

The Israeli government decided to halt its air and ground assault from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. yesterday in the wake of a strike Jan. 6 on a Gaza school compound run by the UN, in which at least 40 Palestinians were killed. Thousands of civilians were seen streaming out of their homes and going into local groceries to stock up on food during the break.

The army may institute a similar suspension every other day if allowed by the “operational situation,” Major Peter Lerner, a military spokesman, said.

Hamas said it would hold fire during those hours too, Agence France-Presse reported.

The Israeli army said its investigations showed that “among the dead in the school were members of the military wing of the Hamas terror organization and a cell firing rockets and mortars at Israeli forces.”

The military accused Hamas of making “cynical use” of civilians by firing from schools. The UN Relief and Works Agency said it was “99.9 percent” certain there were no militants in the school.

To contact the reporters on this story: Calev Ben-David Jerusalem at cbendavid@bloomberg.net; Saud Abu Ramadan in Gaza City through the Tel Aviv newsroomt .

Last Updated: January 8, 2009 02:13 EST