The Islamic State has taken credit for the Ohio State University attack. The terrorist group called 18-year-old assailant Abdul Razak Ali Artan it's "soldier."
BBC reported that the group made the announcement through the Amaq news agency, one of its affiliates. The claim is still unconfirmed. Investigators are checking if the attacker had direct contact with the terrorist group.
It is highly likely that the two parties communicated online. However, there is also the possibility that Artan was inspired by the group if there was no direct contact.
"The executor of the attack in the American state of Ohio is a soldier of the Islamic State and he carried out the operation in response to calls to target citizens of international coalition countries," Amaq said. It was not confirmed whether Artan was given direct orders from abroad or if he had been self-radicalized.
It was previously reported that Abdul Razak Ali Artan plowed a car into the Ohio State University campus hitting people and stabbing others with a butcher knife on Monday morning. He was shot dead by a police officer who responded to the scene.
Artan posted a rant on his Facebook page about reaching a "boiling point" and even made references about "lone wolf attacks" as well as radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki. "America! Stop interfering with other countries, especially Muslim Ummah [community]," the post read. "We are not weak. We are not weak, remember that."
In an interview with the school's student newspaper back in August, via The Daily Beast, the Ohio State University attacker described himself as a "pious and scared Muslim." "I wanted to pray in the open, but I was scared with everything going on in the media," he said.
"I'm a Muslim, it's not what the media portrays me to be. If people look at me, a Muslim praying, I don't know what they're going to think, what's going to happen. But, I don't blame them. It's the media that put that picture in their heads so they're going to just have it and it, it's going to make them feel uncomfortable."
