Thursday on CNN’s “Wolf,” host Wolf Blitzer asked Rep. Peter King (R-NY), member of the House Committee on National Security and the Select Committee on Intelligence, whether he had any reason to doubt Canadian Prime Minister Harper’s claim that Wednesday’s shootings in Ottawa were an “act of terror.”
“No, Wolf,” King said. “The more evidence that comes in, to me, made it more and more clear that this was an act of Islamist terrorism. The question would be was he acting on his own or was he acting in concert with others, did he have a loose confederation with other Islamists. There’s no doubt to me right now that this was an act of Islamist terrorism.”
“It’s very seldom that someone is an absolute lone wolf,” King explained. “I know we use that term a lot, but I would say in many of these cases you find that the so-called ‘lone wolf’ actually knows others who are involved in the movement. Some may take direction, they just may have a loose alliance, so it’s a combination of being inspired and of meeting with others.”
“Your committee oversees the Department of Homeland Security, the intelligence community… what lessons do you think the U.S. should be learning about what happened in Ottawa yesterday?” Wolf asked King.
“It should be a wakeup to the American people, to the media,” King said. “That’s why it’s so important, Wolf, I know the Canadian Prime Minister was saying that they may have to change their laws, I don’t think we have to change our laws in this country, I just think we have to put aside a lot of the political correctness because we can have all the technology in the world, and that’s important, but also, I think we have to see increased surveillance, similar to what the NYPD was doing, in the Muslim community so we’ll have a head start as to who might be a so-called lone wolf, or what small groups are working together.”
Follow Daniel Nussbaum on Twitter @NussBB
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.