KENYA Hotel blast evokes earlier attacks

Kenyan police are questioning 12 people about the attack on the hotel and an Israeli airliner.
COMBINED DISPATCHES
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- Suicide bombers blew up a hotel lobby full of Israeli tourists near the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa, killing 16 people, just after two missiles narrowly missed an Israeli charter flight leaving the city.
The attacks Thursday came about five minutes apart, and the apparent coordination recalled the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania carried out by Al-Qaida in 1998. Kenyan, Israeli and U.S. investigators were looking for an Al-Qaida link in Thursday's assaults, although a previously unknown organization, the Army of Palestine, claimed responsibility in a fax sent from Lebanon.
An Israeli army team began today evacuating tourists injured in the suicide bombing. The blast at the Paradise Hotel killed 10 Kenyans, three Israelis and the three suicide bombers. Two of the dead Israelis were sisters.
Gilad Millo, a spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry, said 235 tourists, including 15 injured in the blast and the bodies of the three Israelis, were flown home today. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon sent his official plane to carry some of the Israelis.
Witness accounts
Witnesses at the hotel, a favorite of Israeli package-tour groups, described a grisly scene of fire, bloodied and burned victims and children screaming for missing parents. Many of the bodies of the dead were burned beyond recognition and trapped in the debris of the lobby. Just outside the entrance, a human jawbone lay on the road near the twisted wreckage of the bombers' sport-utility vehicle, used to smash a gate to gain entrance to the secluded beachside complex.
Kenyan police said they picked up 12 people for questioning about the blast and the attempted attack on the Israeli airliner.
The Israeli-chartered airliner that was fired on Thursday morning had just delivered many of the tourists to Mombasa and was heading back to Israel with 261 passengers and 11 crew members on board. The pilot reported seeing two white smoke trails on the plane's left side.
As authorities concluded that the two events were probably related, Israeli air force jets were sent to escort the Arkia flight the rest of the way home.
In Mombasa, police reported seeing three or four men with Arab features fleeing the vicinity of the airport in a van shortly after the missiles were fired. Although Israeli authorities said they could not be sure what was fired at the Arkia flight, casings for shoulder-launched missiles were found later about a mile from the airport.
Is Al-Qaida to blame?
In Israel, Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the events as a "terror attack against Israel" and warned that they represented "a serious escalation of international terrorism."
The attacks, if linked to Al-Qaida, would be the first by the terrorist network against Israeli targets. Authorities suspect the network also was involved in a nightclub bombing in Bali, Indonesia, that left 191 dead in October.
Recent taped remarks attributed to bin Laden were highly critical of Israel and raised concerns that Israelis could become a new target of the group.
But Reuters news service received a fax Thursday from an unknown Lebanese group calling itself the Army of Palestine and claiming responsibility for the attacks. The fax indicated the group had sent two "units" to Kenya to "strike at Israeli interests."
Palestinian leaders said they had not heard of the group before.
The Israeli army sent a team of 150 doctors, psychologists and soldiers to Kenya's Indian Ocean coast after the attacks.
"The situation is a disaster. An Israeli does not know where to go," said Yossi Msika, a tourist, as he walked toward the plane for the flight home to Israel.
U.S. response
The U.S. State Department urged Americans in Kenya to exercise extra caution after the attacks. President Bush labeled the violence as terrorism.
The attacks, Bush said, "underscore the continuing willingness of those opposed to peace to commit horrible crimes. Those who seek peace must do everything in their power to dismantle the infrastructure of terror that makes such actions possible."
The United States "remains firmly committed ... to fight against terror and those who commit these heinous acts," the president said in a written statement from his Texas ranch, where he was spending the Thanksgiving holiday.
He extended his condolences "to the victims and their families and to the governments and peoples of Israel and Kenya."
Israel Army Radio, citing unspecified Arab media, identified one of the suspects in the Kenya attacks as Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah. A man by that name has been indicted in the United States in the embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, for which Al-Qaida was blamed. However, the radio report could not be confirmed.
Hints and warnings
Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed, head of Al-Muhajiroun, a militant Islamic group in London that recruits on university campuses and encourages members to join armed struggles abroad, said today he had been aware for several days of a threat to East Africa. Australia's foreign ministry said it also had received vague warnings.
Bakri Mohammed, who is closely monitored by British security officials because of his radical views, said unspecified warnings had been posted on Web sites and on Internet chat rooms.
"The warning has been sent to the Muslim community around the world ... that Israel would pay a heavy price in East Africa," he told the British Broadcasting Corp.
Sharon has put the Mossad spy agency in charge of investigating the twin attacks. By today, Israeli and U.S. security officials were combing the hotel area for clues.
The deadly attack on the 160-bed hotel occurred as new guests were checking in and others were eating breakfast.
Witnesses said a four-wheel-drive vehicle smashed through the main gate to the hotel compound and stopped in front of the lobby.
Some witnesses said three men who looked like Arabs were in the car. One ran into the lobby and blew himself up, while the others remained in the vehicle as it exploded.