Emails: Terrorists claimed Benghazi role within hours

WASHINGTON -- Two hours after the U.S. Consulate came under attack in Benghazi, Libya, the White House was told that a militant group was claiming responsibility for the violence that killed the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.

A State Department email sent to intelligence officials and the White House situation room said the Islamist group Ansar al-Sharia claimed responsibility on Facebook and Twitter, and also called for an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli.

The document may fuel Republican efforts to show that the White House knew it was a terrorist attack, even as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations was saying -- five days afterward -- that it appeared to be a protest gone awry.

The Obama administration's account of the Benghazi events has become a campaign issue, with Republican challenger Mitt Romney and GOP lawmakers accusing the White House of misleading Americans about the nature of the attack.

The Associated Press and other news organizations obtained the unclassified email and two related emails from government officials who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about them publicly.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said yesterday that the review board she appointed to investigate the attack is "looking at everything," rather than "cherry-picking one story here or one document there."

White House press secretary Jay Carney said the emails represented just one piece of information that came in at the time.

"There were emails about all sorts of information that was becoming available in the aftermath of the attack," Carney said. "The whole point of an intelligence community and what they do is to assess strands of information and make judgments about what happened and who is responsible."

Meanwhile, the Tunisian government said it has arrested a 28-year-old Tunisian, Ali Harzi, linked to the U.S. Consulate attack.

In Egypt, a security official said a local militant suspected of involvement in the Benghazi attack was killed in clashes in Cairo when he attacked approaching Egyptian forces.