It was "ridiculous" for the New York Police Department to change the policy under former Commissioner Ray Kelly to monitor mosques, since it could provide critical information about potential terrorist attacks, former New York Republican Mayor Rudy Giuliani told Fox News' "America's Newsroom."
"Totally ridiculous to interfere with the policy that Commissioner Kelly had in New York of allowing police officers to go into mosques in order to monitor what's going on inside a mosque.
"That's a place we should be monitoring. We should be listening. It has been the source of any number of attacks," Giuliani said Wednesday.
In April, New York Democratic
Mayor Bill de Blasio shut down the controversial police counterterror surveillance unit that sent plainclothes officers into areas of the city, including mosques, to eavesdrop for evidence of terror plots.
Giuliani stressed that the policy didn't mean "every mosque ... every Muslim," or even a "majority of them."
He said what it did mean was "we shouldn't be stupid," since there had been some attacks in the U.S., like the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, which originated from "a mosque in New Jersey."
The practice was especially important, Giuliani said, with the current threat to the U.S. from the Islamic State (ISIS) and the group's stated goal of attacking the country.
On Tuesday, threats from the Islamic State as well as recent terror attacks prompted the Department of Homeland Security to announce the United States was increasing security at government buildings in Washington and cities around the country. Giuliani said he would "assume" the action was in response to a specific threat.
"I can't tell you if there is specific information, or this is just being done based on the fact that we don't know that much about ISIS, which is amazing," he said. "I think this kind of security should have been supplied a year or two ago. But we seem to be an extremely reactionary government, and I don't mean that in a politically ideological sense."
Giuliani said he thought President Barack Obama, because of his "seeming understanding of the Muslim religion," would have reached out to the "so-called moderate Muslims to get them more activated, to get them out front when things go wrong."
"The president's been very, very weak on activating that part of the Muslim community. And, I think that's an area in which he could have a great deal of influence," Giuliani said.
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