PALESTINIAN fighters fired rockets from Gaza into southern Israel today in retaliation for a spate of attacks on Muslim worshippers in Jerusalem in recent days.

Air raid sirens sounded as violence erupted for the second day in a row during a sensitive period of overlapping religious festivals.

The Israeli military said that seven rockets launched from the Gaza Strip had all exploded in midair. No group claimed responsibility.

The rocket attacks followed a night of Israeli police attacks on Muslims going to pray at the al-Aqsa mosque, Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site.

At least six people were injured in the latest violence, the Palestinian Red Crescent reported. The Islamic Waqf authorities, which manage the compound, said that Israeli police had fired stun grenades and rubber bullets to disperse crowds.

The Israeli police claimed that “dozens of law-breaking juveniles” had fomented chaos, throwing stones and other objects at officers and compelling police to act to restore “security, law and order.”

More Palestinians had gathered in the mosque, responding to calls by Waqf authorities to pray inside overnight.

At one of the mosque entrances, police officers could be seen escorting dozens of Palestinians out of the compound.

The attacks followed Israeli police storming the mosque earlier on Wednesday, firing stun grenades at Palestinians who threw stones and fireworks.

Unrest in the region was less intense than the previous days, but the rocket fire raised fears of more violence as Jews began the week-long Passover holiday, hundreds of Christians in Jerusalem’s Old City gathered for Holy Thursday at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to commemorate the Last Supper and Muslims marked the Ramadan holy month.

United Nations Middle East envoy Tor Wennesland said he was “appalled by the images of violence” at al-Aqsa, condemning the beating and mass arrests of Palestinians as well as reports of Palestinians stockpiling firecrackers and stones.

Palestinian UN ambassador Riyad Mansour expressed “outrage and condemnation” of the attack, telling reporters: “It is the right of the Palestinian Muslim worshippers to exercise their religious duties and prayers in this holy month of Ramadan and in any other time in this holy Aqsa mosque.”

Al-Aqsa is the third-holiest site in Islam and stands on a hilltop known to Jews as the Temple Mount, which is the holiest site in Judaism.

Conflicting claims over it have spilled into violence before, including a bloody 11-day war between Israel and Gaza-based Palestinian resistance group Hamas two years ago.