The body of a female tourist has been found bound and repeatedly stabbed outside Jerusalem, Israeli police said.

The Israeli press have identified the woman as Christine Logan. Her identity has been given alternatively as British and American.

Her friend, identified by the press as Kaye Wilson, was also found bound with her hands behind her back bleeding from multiple stab wounds.

She told police they were attacked while hiking in a nearby forest.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said he could not confirm any details about the dead woman or her friend.

A massive manhunt for Ms Logan was launched after Ms Wilson was discovered.

Ms Wilson, from the UK, had reported her friend missing a day earlier after she was found in the same area, police said.

She said the two had been hiking in a nearby forest when they were assaulted by two Arab men, according to police.

Before the body was found, police had been investigating possibilities other than a politically motivated crime. The discovery of the stabbed and bound body, however, reinforced the possibility that politics was involved.

Yuval Weiss, director of Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, told Army Radio he expected Wilson would be released within several days.

Police said she told them she managed to escape her assailants by pretending she was dead. Afterward, she made it to a parking area where other people alerted authorities.