JERUSALEM - Since the Sept. 11 attacks, Israel has been trying to link its battles against Palestinians to the Bush administration's global war against terrorism. But despite enduring attacks that have claimed hundreds of lives, including nine Thursday in Kenya and at home, Israel has been unable to persuade the world that it is fighting the same war as the United States.

Making that link could enable Israel's military to take harsher, perhaps decisive action against Palestinian militant groups and the Palestinian Authority, which Israel accuses of being complicit in the guerrilla war now in its third year.

On Thursday, Israeli citizens came under attack three times on two continents, and the country's leaders once again pressed for public support of an effort against what they call "terror that has no boundaries and no borders."

A car bomb at a seaside resort in Kenya claimed three Israeli lives. Also in Kenya, two shoulder-launched missiles barely missed an Israeli passenger jet. At home, Palestinian gunmen shot to death six people at a polling booth in northern Israel.

The groups that carried out the attacks in Kenya and Israel were different. But Israelis detect few differences in the motives of various militant organizations.

"They all have the same objective, to target Israelis for just being Israelis," said Jonathan Peled, the deputy spokesman for Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. "The terrorists, whether they be Palestinians or others, are not willing to accept our existence. They are aiming to destroy us."

News agencies reported that there were two competing claims of responsibility for the bombing but that Israeli intelligence agents did not consider the claims solid.

Kenyan and Israeli authorities blamed Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida organization, which has targeted Western, particularly American, institutions throughout the world.

While the differences may be lost on Israelis, who say they are being targeted regardless of who is behind the attacks, the distinctions are crucial to Palestinians. They believe their fight for a state is legitimate and to some extent justifies the use of violence.

"The war here is to end the occupation," Khalil Shikaki, a leading Palestinian pollster, said in Ramallah. "The war conducted by al-Qaida is not a war that the Palestinians can identify with. The Palestinians are not waging a religious war. The Palestinians have no conflict with the West."

Shikaki said that the attack in Kenya "plays into Israel's hands. There is no doubt that this will make it easier for Israel to consolidate its occupation rather then end it. They can do it now with international acquiescence."

U.S. officials have increased their pressure on Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat since Sept. 11, and bombings that greeted various American mediators over the past year prompted President Bush to urge the Palestinians to remove Arafat or dilute his power.

Israel has isolated Arafat, bulldozed his presidential compound and reoccupied the West Bank. But the United States has cautioned Israel not to exile or otherwise harm Arafat and has urged an end to military strikes and has continued to support creation of a Palestinian state.

Israeli leaders use every opportunity to press for more flexibility. Sharon has repeatedly borrowed Bush's war rhetoric to describe his battles, calling Arafat "Israel's bin Laden." Israel has tried to link Palestinian militant groups to a larger network of terrorists and their sponsors, including al-Qaida, the Hezbollah militia in southern Lebanon and to Iraq, Iran and Syria.

If the attacks in Kenya are eventually linked to the al-Qaida network, they would mark that group's first direct actions against Israelis. They could have the effect of allying the United States more closely with Israel's military actions.

Israel has often targeted militant leaders in other countries. "Israel will hunt down those who spilled the blood of its citizens," Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Thursday night. "No one will emerge unscathed."

Yesterday, as a convoy of Israeli C-130 cargo planes brought home more than 280 citizens from Kenya, including those wounded in the bombing, Israeli Cabinet ministers were making their case on television.

Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu summoned an audience of ambassadors to Jerusalem to tell them that words of condolence would not be enough. "We will have to take action," he said of the Kenya blast. "We expect your support."

Netanyahu urged the ambassadors to develop new measures to safeguard civilian aviation. "Now you see that that terrorists have no moral borders," he said. "Yesterday they crossed a new threshold. This was the second wake-up call, after Sept. 11."

Sitting in the front row at the briefing was Kenya's ambassador to Israel, John Malan Sawe. Next to him was U.S. Ambassador Daniel C. Kurtzer. Asked about Israel's seeing no distinction between militant groups, Kurtzer succinctly commented, "Nor do we."

Shikaki, the Palestinian pollster, said that Palestinians must stop carrying out attacks to avoid being associated with al-Qaida. "The Palestinians see their best interest as being aligned with the international community," he said, "rather than fighting the international community."

Peled, the Foreign Ministry spokesman, said the world was slowly realizing that militant groups "can strike anyone anywhere. It is something the whole international community should be worried about. Terrorism often starts with Israel, but it never ends with Israel."

Peled maintained that Israel still believed that only diplomacy could end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"We can only achieve that once the Palestinians realize that they have to change their leadership," he said, "or the leadership realizes that they have to change their support for terror."