JERUSALEM — Three rockets fired from Gaza exploded in an industrial section of the Israeli city of Ashkelon on Monday, the military said, causing no casualties but pointing toward an escalation of violence between Israel and Gaza militants.

The attack raised Israeli-Palestinian tensions already heightened by Israel’s destruction of an old hotel in an Arab east Jerusalem neighborhood to replace it with Jewish housing.

The rockets hit south of the populated sections of Ashkelon, the military said. The city, six miles north of Gaza, has become a frequent target of Palestinian rockets when clashes escalate.

Israel often retaliates for rocket attacks with airstrikes at militant facilities and smuggling tunnels in Gaza. Israel blames Gaza’s militant Islamic Hamas rulers for all attacks from the territory, though Hamas claims that smaller splinter groups are behind most of the rocket fire.

The barrage aimed at Ashkelon came just a day after Hamas leaders appealed to the smaller groups to hold their fire.

 

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