The Al-Qaida-linked Somali terrorist group Al-Shabaab is claiming responsibility for a bombing in Nairobi this week that killed at least 21 people. Al-Shabaab says that the attack was a response to U.S. President Donald Trump recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in December 2017.
Nineteen people remain unaccounted for two days after the bombing, which targeted a hotel complex in Nairobi, the Red Cross said on Thursday, raising the possibility of a considerably higher death toll.
In a two-page statement claiming responsibility for the attack, Al-Shabaab did not spell out why it had chosen to hit Kenya over Trump's decision on Jerusalem.
It said the attack was "a response to the witless remarks of U.S. president, Donald Trump, and his declaration," and that it was targeting "Western and Zionist interests worldwide and in support of our Muslim families in Palestine."
Asked about the claim, a White House National Security Council spokesman said in a statement: "This senseless act is a stark reminder of why the United States remains resolved in our fight to defeat radical Islamist terrorism."
Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said on Wednesday evening that a 20-hour siege had ended with security forces killing all the Somali terrorists who had stormed the hotel complex, driving hundreds of people into terrifying escapes.
Kenya, the East African hub for multinational companies and the United Nations, became a frequent target for Al-Shabaab after Kenya sent troops into neighboring Somalia in 2011 to try to create a buffer zone along its border.
Sixteen Kenyans including a policeman, an American survivor of the World Trade Center bombing, and a British development worker were among the dead in the hotel complex, Nairobi Police Chief Joseph Boinnet said.
