Tel Aviv  - Palestinian militants fired a rocket at southern Israel Wednesday night, the first since Israeli troops withdrew from the strip last week, the military said.

A military spokesman in Tel Aviv said the rocket was launched from the central Gaza Strip, near the refugee camp of el-Bureij, and landed at the kibbutz (agricultural commune) of Re'im, in the southern Israeli Eshkol region.

The spokesman said that while this was the first rocket launched since Israel pulled its troops from Gaza, militants had fired some 12 mortar shells from the coastal salient since then.

Israel has vowed to respond harshly to any new rockets launched after it declared a unilateral truce. The January 18 truce ended a ferocious 22-day offensive in Gaza aimed at curbing such attacks at southern Israel. dpa