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Two or three US citizens from Minneapolis and a British widow are suspects, unconfirmed, in Nairobi Westgate shopping mall terror attack. Death toll stands at 72 victims and dozens are still unaccounted for. As happens in a terror strike, the lethal force is indiscriminate and has an ugly face. Society in Nairobi is uprooted and precious lives are lost. How are we doing in the War On Terror? Some narrow escapes and heroics are reported – ‘You’re a very bad man’: Brave four-year-old confronts Kenya mall gunman, who spared their lives and begged for forgiveness.
Kenya president: Terrorists defeated, 72 dead, more bodies trapped
(CBS News) – In a televised address to the nation today, Kenyatta said “we have ashamed and defeated our attackers.” He said the attack had left 240 casualties, including 61 dead civilians and six of his security forces. He said five terrorists were killed and another 11 suspects have been taken into custody.
The president says three floors of the Westgate mall collapsed and that there are “several bodies still trapped in the rubble including the terrorists.” He declared three days of national mourning.
The Kenya Police took to Twitter after Kenyatta spoke.
Kenya mall attack terrorists included “two or three” Americans, Kenyan FM Amina Mohamed says
WASHINGTON (Star Tribune/CBS News) — Two or three Americans and one Briton were among those who attacked a Nairobi shopping mall, Kenya’s foreign minister said Monday.
More than 60 people have been killed in the assault on the upscale mall, which has lasted for three days. The foreign minister, Amina Mohamed, said in an interview with PBS’ “NewsHour” program that the Americans were 18 to 19 years old, of Somali or Arab origin and lived “in Minnesota and one other place” in the U.S. The attacker from Britain was a woman who has “done this many times before,” Mohamed said.
U.S. officials said they were looking into whether any Americans were involved. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Monday the department had “no definitive evidence of the nationalities or the identities” of the attackers.
White House spokesman Ben Rhodes said U.S. officials have seen “reports coming out of al-Shabab that indicate information along those lines,” referring to possible involvement of Americans in the attack.
“But we have to run those to ground, of course,” he said. “We do monitor very carefully and have for some time been concerned about efforts by al-Shabab to recruit Americans or U.S. persons to come to Somalia.
Friends and family of Co Down (Belfast) raised White Widow ‘shocked’ at link to terror attack
(Belfast Telegraph) – The friends and family of the Co Down raised White Widow Samantha Lewthwaite have reacted with shock and disbelief to claims that she is behind the Kenyan shopping mall massacre.
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Speculation is rife that the terror suspect, who was married to the July 7 suicide bomber Jermaine Lindsay, was one of the masterminds behind the atrocity which has claimed more than 60 lives. Dubbed the White Widow, Lewthwaite is wanted in connection with an atrocity in Kenya, her alleged role in bomb-making factories and terrorist activity in Yemen.
Converted to Islam and Married London Bomber Germaine Lindsay
After converting to Islam at 17, Lewthwaite changed her name to Sherafiyah and married Lindsay, who detonated the bomb at King’s Cross Tube station, killing 26 people in July 2005. At the time she claimed to have been horrified by the killings, but in 2009 disappeared with her three children and only resurfaced two years later after travelling to Kenya on a false passport.
Kenya’s foreign minister, Amina Mohamed, has fuelled further speculation by claiming a British woman who has allegedly been involved in terrorism “many times before” was among the militants who laid siege to the Westgate mall, leaving at least six Britons dead.
A Pregnant Lewthwaite Flees Kenya’s Kangaroo Courts
March 11, 2012 – A top Kenyan police official said Samantha Lewthwaite was part of a group of British citizens and other foreign nationals who arrived in Kenya last year to seek refuge from an increasingly hostile police state in Britain. It was alleged that she was in charge of finances for the group of immigrants.
Officials in Kenya have increased the practice of arbitrary detention of foreigners and Kenyan Muslims in fear that collaborations between elements sympathetic to the re-unification group al-Shabaab may plan an attack to stop the Kenyan invasion of Southern Somalia initiated this past October.
Lewthwaite came under Kenyan scrutiny as British officials passed intelligence to Mombasa indicating that she was the widow of one of the alleged 7/7 bombers, Jermaine Lindsay. Her whereabouts are unknown although it is widely assumed that she might have sought refuge in Shabaab controlled Somalia. Lewthwaite, traveling with three children, is pregnant, the official also said, and remarried to a Kenyan who has also fled the country.
