After footage from several surveillance cameras showing four of the attackers inside the Westgate mall during the deadly siege aired on Kenyan television Friday night, local news media reported the names of four of the attackers: Abu Baara al-Sudani, Omar Nabhan, Khattab al-Kene and a man known only as Umayr.
"I can confirm that those are the names of the terrorists," said Maj. Emmanuel Chirchir, a spokesman for the military. At least one attacker — Mr. Nabhan — is believed to be Kenyan.
The Shabab, a militant Somali Islamist group, has claimed responsibility for the attack, in which more than 60 people were killed. But analysts said members of the group's Kenyan affiliate, known as Al Hijra, were involved both in the logistics and the execution of the attack.
Mr. Nabhan is believed to be related to Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, a suspect in the bombing of an Israeli hotel on the Kenyan coast in 2002 and the attacks on the American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. The elder Mr. Nabhan was one of the most wanted Islamic militants in Africa when American commandos killed him in September 2009 near the town of Baraawe in southern Somalia.
On Saturday, Western military personnel attacked a house in that same town where Shabab militants were staying, killing one, a spokesman for the Shabab said. The spokesman, Sheik Abdiaziz Abu Musab, said in a telephone interview that a firefight broke out, lasting at least an hour and a half. "The attackers were not able to enter the house," said Sheik Musab. "Our fighters were fighting very hard."
The attack was carried out by British and Turkish special forces, and one British commander was killed, he said. However, British and Turkish government officials denied that their countries were involved in any way, Reuters reported. A British Defense Ministry spokeswoman said, "We are not aware of any British involvement in this at all."
Sheik Musab declined to comment on the identities of the mall attackers who were caught on the surveillance video. "We haven't said anything about the attackers," he said. "We are not going to comment on the issue — whether it is incorrect or correct."
The footage that aired on the Kenyan television station NTV showed one of the militants loitering in a checkout aisle of the Nakumatt supermarket, talking on his cellphone. Other footage showed four of the attackers carrying automatic rifles as they searched what appeared to be a storeroom at the mall. They moved almost nonchalantly, as if in no particular rush.
Kenya's security services have been criticized for what many here have called a slow and even bungled response, and there has been widespread, systematic looting at the mall. President Uruhu Kenyatta has announced an inquiry into the security services' response to the attack, and the military has asked storeowners who lost money or merchandise to come forward.
The government initially said 10 to 15 attackers were responsible for the attack, but Western officials have since said the number was probably far lower.
Matt Bryden, the former head of the United Nations Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea, said the tactics used in the attack were similar to those used by the Shabab in a number of operations in Somalia this year. But he also said that local help was needed to pull off an attack on that scale, and that several of the men identified as taking part in the attack were members of Al Hijra.
"We should certainly expect Al Hijra and Al Shabab to try again," Mr. Bryden said. "And we should expect them to have the capacity to do so."
