In what appears a well-coordinated global terror attack targeting Israeli diplomats, an embassy car exploded near the Aurangzeb Road-Safdarjung Road crossing here, barely 500 metres from the Prime Minister’s residence, on Monday afternoon. Elsewhere, a car bomb was defused in an Israeli embassy vehicle in Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital.
Israel blamed both Iran and Hezbollah for these attacks. Intelligence sources claimed five Iranian scientists had been killed in the past two years in the same way, and the possibility of Monday’s incident being an act of retaliation is being looked into.
An Israeli woman diplomat, Til Yehoshua, 40, an administrative attache and also the wife of the Israeli defence attache, her driver Manoj Sharma, 42, and two others travelling in an Indica just behind the Innova (109CD35) — Arun Sharma, 61, and Manjit Singh, 75 — were injured. Ms Yehoshua was going to Chanakyapuri to pick up her children at the American School. The injured were rushed to Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, and Ms Yehoshua was later shifted to Primus Hospital.
Initial investigations indicate the Innova was being tailed by a man on a motorcycle. He stuck an external magnetic remote device on its rear as it stopped at a traffic signal, an eyewitness reported. It burst into flames minutes later. The Indica and another car were also damaged.
Ranvir Singh, owner of a nearby petrol pump, says he heard a loud noise and rushed to the spot. “This was at 3.20 pm. I was at my petrol pump and I heard a loud noise. I rushed to the spot and found a car ablaze. A fire tender from the nearby Air Force station was dousing flames,” he said. Officials said the modus operandi of triggering an explosion on a moving vehicle using a remote control device was the first such case in India.
Delhi police commissioner B.K. Gupta said the special cell would investigate. Dr Deep Makkar of Primus said the woman diplomat had “suffered spinal and liver injuries, but her vitals are stable”.