JERUSALEM - SIX Jews killed in the bloody Mumbai attacks are to be laid to rest in Israel on Tuesday in ceremonies expected to draw thousands of mourners.

Officials braced for particularly huge crowds at the funeral of Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg and his wife Rivka, who ran a cultural and outreach centre of the ultra-orthodox Chabad-Lubavitch movement that was among the targets of Islamist militants whose attacks left 188 people dead.

The couple were among those who died when the heavily-armed extremists stormed into the five-storey complex in India's commercial capital. The six Jewish victims included four Israelis, one US citizen and one Mexican.

The ceremony is to be held at the Chabad headquarters in Kfar Chabad near Tel Aviv, followed by the burials at Jerusalem's Mount of Olives.

Mourners were also expected to throng Mea Sharim, an enclave of strictly observant ultra-Orthodox Jews in Jerusalem, where ceremonies will be held for two of the victims.

Also among those killed in the attack on Chabad house was Mexican citizen Norma Schwartzblatt-Rabinowitz who had planned to move this week to Israel where she will now be laid to rest.

On Monday night, a brief ceremony was held at Ben Gurion airport near Tel Aviv as the flag-draped coffins were flown from India aboard an Israeli air force plane.

Dozens of family members and some cabinet ministers attended the ceremony.

Among those on the plane were the parents of Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, who had earlier attended an emotional ceremony at a Mumbai synagogue where the orphaned Moshe cried out for his parents.

Ms Samuel, who was given a passport at the last minute, also travelled to Israel for the ceremony.

On Monday, Mumbai's Jewish community paid a tearful farewell to the couple who ran Chabad House, which served as an educational centre, synagogue and a hostel for Israeli tourists.

Rabbi Rivka's father, Shimon Rosenberg, told about 100 mourners at the Keneseth Eliyahoo Synagogue that Chabad House will be rebuilt.

'The house they built here in Mumbai will live with them. They were the mother and father of the Jewish community in Mumbai,' a tearful Mr Rosenberg said.

'The House of Chabad will live again.' Founded in the 18th century in Russia, Chabad is one of the largest Hassidic sects, whose members remain profoundly attached to their traditions.

India says initial investigations show all 10 militants who carried out the coordinated Mumbai attacks were Pakistani, and suggest they may have been members of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba Islamist group that has been battling India's rule in disputed Kashmir. -- AFP