Americans Injured in Deadly Kenya Mall Attack as Al Qaeda-Linked Somali Militant Group Claims Responsibility

By Fox News.

The Al Qaeda-linked Somali militant group al-Shabab is claiming responsibility for a deadly attack targeting non-Muslims at an upscale mall in Kenya’s capital.

A statement from al-Shabab on its official Twitter feed Saturday says the attacks, which killed at least 39 and wounded 150, including American citizens, are retribution for military action by Kenya inside Somalia. The group said it was now shifting the battlefield to Kenya. Police say they are treating the assault as a “terrorist attack.”

Witnesses say the gunmen asked victims they had cornered if they were Muslim: If the answer was yes, several witnesses said, those people were free to go. The non-Muslims were not.

The group said its fighters entered Nairobi’s upscale Westgate Mall at around noon and were still inside more than nine hours later. Kenyan military special forces had entered the mall in an effort to end the standoff.

Officials fear the death toll could rise further. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s office issued a statement confirming diplomat Annemarie Desloges died along with one other unidentified Canadian.

Read more from this story HERE.

____________________________________________________________

Americans injured as Somali-based militants with ties to al-Qaeda claim responsibility for Kenyan shopping mall massacre in which at least 39 have died, some as young two-years-old, while terrorists brazenly live-tweeted the attack

By Ellie Buchdahl, Stuart Woledge and Ryan Gorman.

Americans were injured in a terror attack by as many as 10 gunmen at a Nairobi, Kenya, shopping center that has left 39 people dead and as many as 300 injured.

The US State Department has confirmed that Americans were hurt in the mass shooting Saturday in a statement issued from the US Embassy in Nairobi, but declined to give names or an exact number of Americans hurt. Americans are not believed to be among the dead at this time. The dead range in ages from two to 78-years-old, according to a Kenyan government official.

Somali-based militant group al-Shabaab has claimed responsibility for the atrocity in which men armed with guns and grenades stormed the mall and targeted non-Muslims – al-Shabaab is the Somali arm of al-Qaeda. Amazingly, terrorists live-tweeted the attack until their Twitter account was suspended.

‘We have reports of American citizens injured in the attack, and the U.S. Embassy is actively reaching out to provide assistance,’ Marie Harf, deputy spokesman for the State Department said in the statement.

Read more from this story HERE.