BEIRUT, Lebanon -- Two rockets were fired into northern Israel from southern Lebanon yesterday, and Israel responded minutes later with a barrage of 14 rockets and by scrambling fighter jets across the volatile border, according to Lebanese and Israeli media.

No one was reported injured on either side of the border, often a flash point for conflict between Israel and Lebanese or Palestinian militant groups across the rocky frontier.

It was the first exchange of fire between Israel and militant groups in Lebanon since February, highlighting heightened tensions between two of the Middle East's major players.

Israel and the Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah have been warning in recent weeks that they will retaliate against each other if either side sparks hostilities.

Israeli police said the two rockets landed in the northern Galilee region, one just outside the town of Nahariya. Israel's Channel 10 showed a toppled telephone pole near a kibbutz not far from the border.

The Israeli military said it fired back at the source of the rocket fire in the village of Kleili, south of the southern Lebanese port city of Tyre.

In 2006, a monthlong war sparked by Hezbollah's kidnapping of Israeli soldiers on the border left more than 1,000 dead, mostly Lebanese civilians.

But since that conflict, Israel largely has blamed fringe militant groups, rather than Iranian-backed Hezbollah, for the occasional cross-border salvos. Israel is worried, however, that Hezbollah will become part of the new Lebanese Cabinet and will use the U.S.-backed government as cover to safeguard and bolster its stockpile of heavy weaponry and intelligence apparatus.

Efforts to build a Cabinet collapsed Thursday after Lebanese Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri quit his post, complaining of intransigence by the Hezbollah-led opposition.

Israel and the West have called on Lebanese authorities to disarm Hezbollah, as demanded by the United Nations. Hezbollah says it needs weapons to defend Lebanese civilians from repeated Israeli military incursions.

A statement issued by the Israeli military said it "considers the Lebanese government and Lebanese military as accountable to prevent such attacks."

Lebanon's official National News Agency said the Israeli shells hit uninhabited areas, and "tranquillity was restored to the area," except for continued Israeli warplane flyovers.