On Wednesday, we’ll hold solemn remembrances at Ground Zero and across the country in honor of the nearly 3,000 victims of 9/11. Twelve years later, the terrorist attacks’ effect is still being felt in countless ways, among them the extraordinary measures taken every day by the NYPD to protect our city.
In two months we’ll hold a general election to determine the next mayor. Arguably, any mayor’s most important responsibility is to protect the city from another terrorist attack. But where do the candidates stand on these issues? Surprisingly, we haven’t heard much.
The threat of terrorism is as great, if not greater, today than it was before the World Trade Center was destroyed. Yet I can tell you that none of the candidates has requested a briefing from the Police Department on this topic.
Don’t think for a second that al Qaeda and those who share its ideology have forgotten about New York. Images of the World Trade Center and scenes of the city are regularly displayed on jihadist Web sites and al Qaeda publications.
In just the past 10 months there have been several plots with a nexus to New York City:
– A 23-year-old Bangladeshi here on a student visa plotted to blow up the Federal Reserve Building in Lower Manhattan. He’s now in prison.
– Two brothers from Pakistan, the Qazi brothers, were arrested in Florida after plotting to set off a bomb in New York City. One brother came here specifically to select suitable targets, including Times Square, high profile theaters, restaurants and iconic locations.
– A young Suffolk County man was arrested based on NYPD undercover work as he was boarding a plane to Yemen to seek terrorist training. There’s little doubt that his handlers would have sent him back here to their No. 1 target, New York City.
– An al Qaeda operative trained in Iran met with an accomplice in New York to plot a terrorist attack. One of their targets was a train from New York City to Canada.
– The Boston bombers were on their way to Manhattan armed with pipe bombs and pressure-cooker bombs. Had the man they abducted not escaped, they would’ve arrived in Midtown in time to launch a devastating attack at the morning rush hour.
Our enemies’ enduring obsession with New York is a fact of our history we cannot ignore. I was New York City police commissioner when terrorists first struck the World Trade Center on Feb. 26, 1993. That attack should have been a wake-up call for the nation. It wasn’t. Eight years later came 9/11.
The most important lesson of that day was the most obvious one: This nation was unprepared to prevent major terrorist attacks against the Pentagon and the largest city in America.
When the Bloomberg administration took office, we vowed never to let that happen again. We became the first police department in the country to put in place our own Counterterrorism Bureau. We also restructured our Intelligence Division, which had been focused almost exclusively on dignitary protection. We found the best leaders the federal government had to offer to oversee these functions. We posted senior officers in 11 cities around the world to form relationships with local police agencies.
In short, we built a counterterrorism program second to none, one consistent with the threat we’ve continued to face since 9/11.
Some assert that the NYPD has been insensitive to constitutional rights in protecting the city against a terrorist attack. They’re wrong. The Police Department’s investigations are based on leads and other information about possible criminal conduct. They are never determined by a subject’s religion, ethnic background or political opinion. And if we follow the subject of an approved investigation into a mosque, for instance, this does not put the entire congregation under suspicion.
The NYPD subjects terrorism investigations to a rigorous examination by our attorneys, in conformance with the Handschu guidelines for the investigation of political activities. This process, subject to review by a federal judge, was modeled on similar guidelines used by the federal government for domestic investigations. It establishes strong oversight of cases from beginning to end. Any accusations that it doesn’t are simply false.
We also solicit the advice and support of the community. We hold an annual pre-Ramadan gathering with more than 500 religious and community leaders. We sponsor youth soccer and cricket leagues whose members are predominantly young Muslim men. We assign a direct liaison to the Muslim community and train all our officers in the diverse traditions of the faith.
We have a Muslim police officers’ society with more than 300 members and a Muslim Advisory Council made up of prominent community leaders. They provide guidance to the Police Department on all aspects of our public-safety mission.
Learning about the demographics of the metro area is part and parcel of the Police Department’s work, and an important aspect of our counterterrorism program. At least six of the 9/11 hijackers chose to live in Paterson, NJ, because, according to the 9/11 Commission Report, “There was an Arabic-speaking community there.”
Starting in 2002, we believed it would be prudent to gain a better idea of where individuals sent here to do us harm might try to conceal themselves. Officers visit neighborhoods that have heavy concentrations of populations from countries that produced al Qaeda-inspired terrorists. These officers visit only public locations, in keeping with federal court guidelines.
Contrary to what has been erroneously reported in the media, they do not carry out investigations. They do not operate as undercovers. And they do not engage in blanket surveillance of communities. Not only would this be a pointless waste of time, it would be physically impossible. The unit that does this work has never consisted of more than a handful of officers assigned to it.
Because of this effort, we have a listing of major mosques and their locations, just as we have a listing of Sikh, Coptic and Jewish houses of worship, among others. New York is the most diverse city in the world; we have to be prepared that religious or sectarian violence elsewhere could impact on us here. Knowing the location of vulnerable communities and institutions is crucial in helping us to protect them and our city.
The Qazi brothers’ case is a perfect example. While under federal surveillance for suspected terrorist activities last fall, one of the brothers managed to leave his Miami home undetected and travel to New York. The NYPD was contacted by the FBI and asked to help find him. The only information we had was that he’d made a call from a pay phone in a specific neighborhood in Queens.
As a result of knowing the neighborhood and its religious institutions, we identified a prominent mosque that allowed visitors to stay over for a night. We told the federal authorities this information, and that’s exactly where they found him. Were it not for the NYPD’s Intelligence Division, a terrorism suspect would have been lost.
There’s no question that the global environment has made terrorist attacks both here and abroad a greater possibility, starting with events in Syria. We’re keeping a close eye on that country’s sworn allies, Iran and Hezbollah. Over the past year-and-a-half, there have been no fewer than 15 plots by Iran and Hezbollah aimed at Israeli and Jewish targets worldwide.
Meanwhile, the Syrian insurgency has become a magnet for jihadi militants from around the world, including New York City. We know Americans have joined al Nusra, the al Qaeda offshoot there. What happens when these individuals return home?
Our enemies are smart, patient and committed. In addition to the recent cases I mentioned, since 9/11 there have been plots: to blow up the Herald Square subway station; to attack synagogues in The Bronx and Manhattan; to detonate the fuel lines under JFK airport; to conduct suicide bombings on three rush-hour subway lines; to explode a car bomb in the middle of Times Square; and to attack post office buildings and returning US troops with pipe bombs, just to name a few.
Twelve years after 9/11, New York remains squarely in the crosshairs of global terrorism. Partnership and information-sharing are critical, but far more important than these is political resolve.
We’ve been extremely fortunate to have that in abundance for the past 12 years in New York City. When the Police Department comes under criticism, Mayor Bloomberg never flinches.
Will that resolve still emanate from City Hall come January?
Adapted from Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly’s remarks at a Monday Association for a Better New York-Council on Foreign Relations breakfast.