One dead in Tel Aviv car bombing

The victim has now been named as 35-year-old Lia Malka Cohen, an accountant and former police officer.

Police confirmed that the attack is believed to be criminal, rather than terroristic, in nature, and that Cohen’s two-year-old child was not in the car at the time, after it was feared they had been also been killed as a car seat was found at the scene.

Investigators believe that a small explosive device, weighing around half a kilogram, was placed in her car and detonated as she was on the road during the morning rush hour.

Cohen’s cousin has accused her estranged husband of responsibility for the attack in a post on social media, claiming: “Yes, it's supposedly still under investigation. But it's clear to everyone that her husband, her estranged husband, is the one who likely ordered her murder or did it himself.

"The murderer threatened her and my aunt and uncle for some time, and he continued to walk free and plan the murder. Nobody stopped him.”

Police did not confirm any of these allegations, but did say that the husband had been detained for questioning and that his detention has been extended to June 14.

Per the Walla news agency, the family had filed several complaints against the husband in recent months, while Maariv reports that the man’s lawyer denies his client was involved in the attack, claiming he was asleep at home at the time.

This was the third car to explode in Israel over the last two weeks, as police investigate possible links to organised crime.

Two people were killed in a car bombing near Be'er Sheva on Monday, while a week earlier a man died in a vehicle explosion in Afula.

This story originally appeared in the JC Israel Briefing. You can sign up to receive the briefing daily here.