There was a sound of gunfire, and the impact of bullets striking steel, and the bus suddenly lurched to a stop just outside the northeastern Kenyan city of El Wak.

More than 10 Somali militants clambered on board, heavily armed, witnesses of the Monday attack told the Daily Nation, a Kenyan newspaper. The gunmen began shouting demands at the passengers, ordering them to get off the bus and separate — Muslims on one side, everyone else on the other.

But the Muslims on board the bus en route from Nairobi to the northeastern city of Mandera would not isolate themselves from their fellow passengers, Reuters reported.

Mandera county, where the attack took place, is in Kenya’s northeast along the border with Somalia. When the militants attempted to sort through the passengers, they told ‘‘locals’’ — most of whom are Muslim and ethnic Somalis — that they could get back on and be spared, according to the BBC.

They refused.

‘‘We even gave some non-Muslims our religious attire to wear in the bus so that they would not be identified easily. We stuck together tightly,’’ Abdi Mohamud Abdi, a Muslim who was among the passengers on the bus, told Reuters. ‘‘The militants threatened to shoot us but we still refused and protected our brothers and sisters.’’

Two people were killed before another vehicle approached and the militants ran off, thinking it was the police, passenger Abdirashid Adan told the Daily Nation. At least three others were wounded, Adan among them.

Washington Post