Man killed in car bomb in south Tel Aviv

Criminal background suspected, victim known by police; third bomb in a week after two people were killed Monday in a Petah Tikva "work accident."

By BEN HARTMAN
Aftermath of car bomb in Tel Aviv. (photo credit: COURTESY ISRAEL POLICE)
Aftermath of car bomb in Tel Aviv.
(photo credit: COURTESY ISRAEL POLICE)
An explosion in a car in south Tel Aviv’s Kfar Shalem neighborhood on Saturday night left a man dead in what police said appears to be a criminal attack.
The man who was killed and was known by police for having criminal ties, channel 2 reported Sunday.
The blast on the corner of Sheshet Hayamim and Tekoa streets was the third car bomb in Israel in less than a week, and produced the third fatality.
Magen David Adom paramedics said they tried to pull the driver out of the car but the flames were too strong for them to approach the vehicle.
They had to wait until after the fire was extinguished and pronounced the man dead at the scene.
On Monday, around 4 a.m., an explosion in a car in Petah Tikva left two men dead in what police are treating as a work accident. Central District police said that the men were transporting a bomb to a location where it would be used in an attack when it exploded prematurely.
On Tuesday, police arrested four men. The background to the explosion appeared to be a feud between Petah Tikva criminals, and neither the victims nor the suspects were major organized crime figures, police said.
On Thursday, an Acre man was arrested in Nahariya after he placed a bomb on a car at a shopping center in the latter city. Police said the planned bombing was to target a business rival who worked at the shopping center.
Officers arrested two men over the weekend in connection to the attempted bombing, both residents of the North.
Also on Thursday, a car exploded in a residential neighborhood of Kiryat Yam, near Haifa. That bomb was also linked to a business dispute, police suspect.
Car bombs have become a favored weapon for Israeli criminals in recent years, as they are easy and inexpensive to make. There is a large market for them, and criminals both big-time and amateur have little trouble finding people to provide them with remote-activated bombs that can be devastatingly effective.
In the almost 16 weeks since a blast in Ashkelon in late October killed one man and blew off the left leg of an associate of mob boss Shalom Domrani, 10 car bombs in Israeli cities have killed four men and badly wounded several others.