JERUSALEM, Jan 14 (Reuters) - A guided missile launched from Lebanon killed a 76-year-old woman and her son in a village in northern Israel on Sunday, medical officials said, hours after the Israeli military said it killed four heavily armed militants trying to enter from Lebanon.
Fighting between Israel and Lebanon's Iranian-backed Hezbollah movement has surged in parallel with Israel's more than three-month-old Gaza war against Palestinian Hamas, another ally of Tehran.
An anti-tank missile fired at Kfar Yuval, an agricultural collective abutting the Lebanese border, struck a house, killing the woman and her 40-year-old son, Israeli military and medical officials said.
A 74-year-old man was wounded, a hospital official said, describing him as a member of the same family of farmers.
The military said its forces were striking Hezbollah targets in Lebanon in retaliation. The cross-border exchanges have been the fiercest between Israel and Hezbollah since their 2006 war.
Earlier on Sunday, Israel said its forces killed four militants infiltrating from Lebanon at a location about 15 km (10 miles) northeast of Kfar Yuval.
An Israeli military official said they were armed with rifles, anti-tank missiles, grenades and RPGs and that their affiliation was yet unknown.