TEL AVIV, Israel, Aug. 1 (UPI) -- Five of the seven people killed when a bomb went off in crowded cafeteria in Jerusalem's Hebrew University were U.S. citizens, Israeli police and the U.S. consulate said Thursday.
The two others were Israeli.
Close to 90 people were wounded in Wednesday's blast and the seriously injured include Korean and French citizens who had gone to the university for summer courses and were at the Frank Sinatra cafeteria when a bomb exploded in a bag left there.
Police so far released the names of four Americans and the two Israelis.
They are: Jannis Coulter, 36, the assistant director of the Office of Academic Affairs of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in New York; Benjamin Bluthstein, 25, of Lancaster, Pa.; Marla Bennet, 24, of San Diego; and David Gritz, 24, a dual U.S.-French citizen who lived in Paris.
Coulter, originally of Massachusetts, arrived in Israel Tuesday chaperoning a group of students who were to study there, Menahem Milson, who heads the university's school for overseas students, told United Press International.
Gritz ,who studied Political Science and Philosophy in France, arrived in Israel two weeks ago on a scholarship to study for a year at the Shalom Hartman Institute for Jewish Studies. He was at the university to register for Hebrew lessons, sources at the institute and the French Embassy said.
The two Israelis were identified at Levina Shapira, 53, a university official responsible for student affairs; and David Diego Ladeowisky, 29, a diplomat who was about to leave for Peru for his first foreign assignment.
The name of the fifth American killed Wednesday is being withheld until her family is informed.
The cafeteria and a plaza outside it were crowded with dozens of students on campus for tests, foreign students who came for summer courses, lecturers and university workers on lunch break when the blast occurred.
The Islamic movement Hamas' armed wing, Izel Dein Al Kassem, claimed responsibility for the attack. In a statement, Hamas said the bombing was not a suicide attack but a part of its plan to avenge Israel's killing of its leader, Salah Shehadah.
Shehadah was among 14 people killed in an Israeli operation last week. Israel said Shehada commanded Hamas armed wing, was responsible for hundreds of attacks and was planning especially deadly ones.
"The attack is the price that the Israeli people are paying for the terrorism their government's leaders are practicing against our innocent people and against Hamas figures," Hamas spokesman Abdel Aziz Ranteesi said.
He added that Hamas does not target civilian children.
"Hamas only targets adults who serve as soldiers in the Israeli army who are not innocent and implement their government's orders to kill Palestinians."
The Palestinian Authority issued a statement condemning the attack, calling it a "terrorist operation."
In Washington, President George W. Bush condemned the attack.
"This country condemns that kind of killing, and we send our deepest sympathy to the students and their families."
Daniel Fraham, 20, of Indiana said he arrived on a summer exchange program and had just left friends in the cafeteria when the bomb went off. He said he returned to check on his friends.
"Everything was crazy. It was a nightmare. I saw a young girl being covered over with a sheet. This is real terrorism. Not activism. Not politics but terrorism. How can it be anything else?" he said.
"The people here didn't have anything to do with the conflict. They were just studying," he said.
Yossi Halfon, who was inside the cafeteria at the time and suffered light burns, said: "Suddenly everything became black. You feel a huge heat, you fly. I felt I was running out like a rat."
Another student, Eddi Vaaknin, said people were burned or injured but the most difficult site was that of a girl who didn't seem to be hurt or burned.
"She was dead with beautiful eyes, open," he said.
Fire Department officer Moshe Souissa said his men had to race with wounded from the closed compound to the ambulances carrying victims on stretchers, a wooden plank and in their arms.
The university is under constant guard and people who enter the campus are checked, so it was not immediately clear how the bomb was smuggled into the cafeteria.
The attack was the second in Jerusalem in as many days. Tuesday a suicide bomber, identified as 17-year-old Palestinian, killed himself and injured five Israelis.
Wednesday's attack also came several hours after the Ministerial Committee on National Defense discussed ways to combat terrorism and reportedly decided to deport attackers' families, providing the attorney general finds the legal basis to do so, demolish bombers' homes and confiscate property.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Media Adviser Raanan Gissin told UPI that Israel was experiencing a wave of terror attacks and will respond with all means.
No one had immunity or sanctuary, anywhere, Gissin said.
