Attacker wasn’t known to FBI

A Somali-born student who carried out a car and knife attack at Ohio State University stewed over the treatment of Muslims while apparently staying under the radar of federal law enforcement, underscoring the difficulty authorities face in identifying and stopping “lone wolves” bent on violence.

Abdul Razak Ali Artan was not known to FBI counter-terrorism authorities before Monday’s rampage, which ended with him shot to death by police and 11 people injured, a law enforcement official told the Associated Press.

Law enforcement officials have not identified a motive for the Ohio State violence but have suggested terrorism as a possibility. FBI agents continued to search Artan’s apartment for clues, but Rep. Adam B. Schiff of Burbank, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said he had seen no evidence Artan was directed by or was in communication with any overseas terrorist organization.

On Tuesday, a self-described Islamic State news agency called Artan “a soldier of the Islamic State” who “carried out the operation in response to calls to target citizens of international coalition countries.” The militant group Islamic State has described other attackers around the world as its “soldiers” without specifically claiming to have organized the acts of violence.

The mode of attack — plowing a car into civilians, then slashing victims with a butcher knife — was in keeping with the recommended tactics of jihadi propaganda. And Facebook posts that were apparently written shortly before the attack show Artan nursed grievances against the U.S.