ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan’s air force launched retaliatory airstrikes early Thursday in Iran allegedly targeting militant hideouts, an attack that killed at least seven people and further raised tensions between the neighboring nations.

The strikes in Sistan and Baluchestan province followed Iran’s attack Tuesday on Pakistani soil that killed two children in the southwestern Baluchistan province. The attacks Tuesday and Thursday appeared to target separate Baluch militant groups that the two countries have alleged find safe havens in the other.

The strikes imperil diplomatic relations between the two neighbors, as Iran and nuclear-armed Pakistan have long regarded each other with suspicion over militant attacks.

The attacks also raised the threat of violence spreading in a Middle East unsettled by Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Iran also staged airstrikes late Monday in Iraq and Syria over an Islamic State-claimed suicide bombing that killed over 90 people earlier this month. Iraq has recalled its ambassador from Iran for consultations.

Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry described their attack as “a series of highly coordinated and specifically targeted precision military strikes.”

“This morning’s action was taken in light of credible intelligence of impending large scale terrorist activities,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. “This action is a manifestation of Pakistan’s unflinching resolve to protect and defend its national security against all threats.”

Pakistan’s caretaker Prime Minister Anwaarul-Haq-Kakar, who is in Switzerland to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos, cut his trip short to return home, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said. Foreign Minister Jalil Abbas Jilani is also returning home from a trip to Uganda.

The Baluch Liberation Army, a separatist group, said in a statement the strikes targeted and killed its people.

“Pakistan will have to pay a price for it,” the group warned. “Now the Baluch Liberation Army will not remain silent. We will avenge it and we announce war on the state of Pakistan.”

It wasn’t immediately clear what that meant, as Pakistan’s Baluchistan province, as well as Iran’s neighboring Sistan and Baluchestan province, have faced a low-level insurgency by Baluch nationalists for more than two decades.

Pakistan named its operation “Marg Bar Sarmachar.” In Iranian Farsi, “marg bar” means “death to” — and is a famous saying in Iran since its 1979 Islamic Revolution used to refer to both the United States and Israel. In the local Baluch language, “sarmachar” means guerrilla and is used by the militants operating in the cross-border region.