WASHINGTON Warning of possible missile attacks against U.S. commercial airliners, two lawmakers urged the Bush administration Sunday to act promptly to protect American planes from attacks similar to the one last week on an Israeli airliner in Kenya.

The two Senate Intelligence Committee leaders, Bob Graham, Democrat of Florida, and Richard Shelby, Republican of Alabama, also suggested that those behind the attacks against Israeli targets in Kenya had links to the Al Qaeda network.

They added that assaults at a Kenyan tourist center Thursday foreshadowed further action against the United States, its allies and friends, which could be exacerbated by events in the Middle East.

"What we can anticipate is some increase in activity in the next few weeks," said Graham, the committee chairman. "One of the factors affecting that is the election in Israel, where different groups, for different reasons, want to destabilize the situation in Israel. And then second, the onset of a war against Iraq will be another spike of terrorist activity."

Graham said action to protect American commercial airliners needed to come from the administration immediately, without requiring further action by Congress.

"That should be something initiated immediately by the newly established Transportation Security Agency within the Department of Transportation to respond to this or any other form of attack against commercial aviation or other forms of transportation in the United States," Graham said on the program "Fox News Sunday."

Shelby, the ranking Republican on the panel, said U.S. intelligence agencies were now predicting a "75 percent or better likelihood" of attacks against the United States in the event of any attack on Iraq.

"We are facing a possible extreme spike in the vulnerability to attack inside the United States, which will coincide with the time that Saddam Hussein feels as if he is about to lose power in Iraq and will begin to unleash his agents in the United States," he said.

Shelby said American aircraft in U.S. airspace were especially vulnerable.

"Let's be honest about it," Shelby said. "There are thousands of these surface-to-air missiles around the world. You can buy them, and you can transport them." He added, "Sooner or later, that's going to be one of the methods for the terrorists to hit."

Those behind the attacks in Kenya have not been pinpointed. But Graham confirmed reports that U.S. officials think the errant missile attack on an Israeli airliner and the suicide bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel were the work of Al Itihaad Al Islamiya.

"It's a Somali-Kenyan group that's been in operation for about 10 years, with loose affiliations with Al Qaeda," Graham said. He said he expected U.S. or Israeli investigators to solve the crimes, although he added that the Kenyan authorities were working as hard as they could, given the circumstances.

"They have several problems," Graham said. "One, not only is Kenya a target for terrorist action, Kenya has also become a cell for Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. And second, their capability to do comprehensive investigation is limited."

The suicide bombers blew up the hotel, killing 15 people and wounding scores. Minutes earlier missiles were fired at the Israeli plane taking off nearby and packed with Israeli tourists. The Kenyan police said the missiles were fired from a white utility vehicle, possibly from shoulder-held launchers.

Security experts said secret on-board defenses might have saved the Israeli airliner. Neither lawmaker recommended specific actions the administration should take to better protect U.S. commercial airliners.

But Shelby warned, "The terrorists are looking at our own country."

"There are a lot of terrorists or would-be terrorists in the United States of America, and I believe they are going to look for the soft targets there, as well as overseas," he said.

Graham also predicted that President Saddam Hussein would loose terrorist cadres in the United States should he determine that his rule was endangered.

"We face, according to the consensus view of our intelligence community, a 75 percent or better likelihood of terrorist attacks inside the United States at the point that Saddam Hussein feels that all is lost and he's about to be toppled from power," Graham said.

Over the weekend, the State Department told Americans to be wary of travel in East Africa, particularly Djibouti, a former French colony that is host to thousands of American soldiers. The department also reissued a travel warning for Yemen.(Reuters, AP)