On my way home from Cuba, we stopped in Madrid. It was the first time I had access to internet for over a week. I opened my email and two things stop me for a second: 1) there is a request to write to my Member of Parliament to tell him to vote No in the motion to bomb Syria in the House of Commons; and 2) there is a demo to tell Parliament to vote No! Actually there were two demos two days in a row and a vigil in Walthamstow to pressure Stella Creasy, the local Labour MP to vote no.
The first thing I did was write to my Labour member of Parliament, he voted against the Iraq war, so there is a good chance he will be planning to vote no; but … he has moved so far to the right (he abstained in the Summer budget attack on welfare, unforgivable in my book), but it only takes a few seconds to pull together an email and I do it. I will not be home in time for either the local vigil or the demo that night.
The “Political” Debate
Jeremy Corbyn who opposes the bombing of Syria allows a free vote to happen (this means that Labour Party Members of Parliament (MP) can vote how they want to vote according to their “beliefs”). The shadow foreign secretary, one Hillary Benn (son of the great Tony Benn) speaks in favour of bombing Daesh:
“We are here faced by fascists – not just their calculated brutality, but their belief that they are superior to every single one of us in the chamber tonight, and the people we represent. They hold us in contempt. They hold our values in contempt. They hold our belief in tolerance and decency in contempt. They hold our democracy, the means by which we will make our decision tonight, in contempt. And what we know about fascists is that they need to be defeated (www.theguardian.com/....”
“We are here faced by fascists – not just their calculated brutality, but their belief that they are superior to every single one of us in the chamber tonight, and the people we represent.
They hold us in contempt. They hold our values in contempt. They hold our belief in tolerance and decency in contempt. They hold our democracy, the means by which we will make our decision tonight, in contempt. And what we know about fascists is that they need to be defeated (www.theguardian.com/....”
Most bizarrely for many people, especially those that know history, Hillary Benn compares the proposed bombings of Syria to the partisans of the International Brigades fighting Franco in the Spanish Civil War … bombings have never defeated fascism and as far as I remember, the British state stayed neutral in the Spanish civil war … so, once again, we are forced to ask ourselves, where the hell is this nonsense coming from?
“Benn added: “Socialists and trade unions and others joined the International Brigade in the 1930s to fight against Franco. This entire house stood up against Hitler and Mussolini. And my view is that we must now confront this evil. It is now time for us to do our bit in Syria. And that is why I ask my colleagues to vote for the motion tonight (www.theguardian.com/....”
You know that his father is turning over in his grave and you are thankful that Tony Benn is dead and doesn’t have to see this dribble coming out of his son’s mouth.
Cameron calls Corbyn a “terrorist sympathiser” and argues that we have a “moral obligation” to bomb Daesh. He is asked 7 times to apologise in Parliament for describing opponents to the bombing as “terrorist sympathisers” and he does not do so … the nonsense continues …
The vote in Parliament takes place, happily my local Member of Parliament (John Cryer) votes no, along with 151 other members of Labour party in Parliament. But, Stella Creasy of Walthamstow (along with 65 others) votes yes along with the Tory government … even more the peaceful local vigil which met at a local mosque in Walthamstow and then walked to her local constituency office (leaving post-its spelling NO on the door) is now being accused of being a riot, being in front of her home, and threatening dear Stella. Since it was not a riot and not in front of her home and by all accounts the most threatening thing that was said was that she would have blood on her hands, this is rather bizarre. Other members of Parliament report that they were “threatened” for their votes; one is a Tory MP from Telford, Lucy Allan, who says she has gotten a death threat. This is what all the newspapers carry and seem to be concerned with. The fact that Parliament (and that included 66 Labour MPs, the Scottish National Party voted as a bloc against) voted for bombing Syria becomes almost irrelevant (except for declaring the first bombing against an oil refinery as a “devastating attack” which completely destroyed the refinery).
Calls for deselection of Labour Party MPs that voted in favour of bombing Syria start. Corbyn has already said he is not in favour of deselection of opponents in Labour) and people advocating deselection are condemned). Corbyn’s allowing an open vote means that they cannot be chastised internally as they were not forced to vote with the party (was this a good choice or a mistake? Did it strengthen or weaken him? The problem is that 66 members of the Parliamentary Labour party voted with the government and that has allowed them a victory that should have been much more difficult.
Weirdly, the biggest story being discussed in the mainstream media is the fact that constituents have “threatened” members of Parliament that voted in favour of the bombing. Tom Watson (Deputy Leader of the Labour party) joins in the nonsense, adds a bit of red-baiting, calls Momentum (the group that is supposed to be supporting Labour outside the Labour Party) “rabble” and supports dear Stella Creasy who has been keeping shtum and Andy Burnham (failed at winning the Labour leadership) also has to demonstrate his complete lack of sense yet again … being meely-mouthed seems to be a Burnham specialty. He did nothing while Corbyn was being bullied by the right of Labour and the mainstream media, yet cries for the poor MPs being bullied. Those that took part in the vigil in Walthamstow say that Tom Watson is trying to bully them and try to set the record straight.
Days pass before Stella Creasy admits the vigil was nowhere near her house and even more, it turns out that a Tory who said she was threatened actually added the threat to the email. Did she enjoy being the centre of attention, the great martyred MP being “bullied” for an unprincipled vote (since the one thing she does lack is political principles irrespective of being a good constituency MP, hey, that is also no surprise). The lies are being exposed … but the damage is done …
Make no mistake about this attempt to stifle political debate and discussion by calling for “polite dialogue” and denouncing opponents as bullies … it is an attempt to deflect responsibility and accountability … if these MPs actually “represent” their constituents, do not their constituents have the right to express their opinions? Do we not have the right to peaceful vigils, demonstrations and criticism of MPs whom we disagree with? Clearly given the trash coming out of the mouths of Labour politicians, bourgeois democracy is only allowed to be expressed by our so-called representatives … once again demonstrating that real democracy where people can express their opinions is a lie …
I would be laughing at the absurdity of the situation, but …
We are at war
Meanwhile, while the mainstream media is concentrating on our poor bullied MPs, evilly maligned and criticised by their constituents, Britain is at war and bombings have commenced … the British have targeted and bombed an oil field under control of Daesh.
The bombing of Raqaa, a Syrian city occupied by Daesh, hits a school, killing 5 children. While Raqaa is the headquarters of Daesh in Syria, it is a city under occupation filled with people who did not have the money or ability to flee Daesh. Those people are literally just trying to survive their nightmare. Bombings there will kill trapped civilians, buft that has not stopped the bombers (France hit Raqaa on their first attack following the atrocity in Paris; the US has also hit Raqaa). The civilians trapped there can do nothing to protect themselves; if they try to flee now, they will have to deal with Daesh and will probably be killed by them. The choices are stark, death by bombing or death under Daesh’s version of Sharia for trying to flee the so-called Caliphate.
Opponents of Assad and Daesh object to the British RAF bombings:
“A spokesman for the Western-backed Free Syrian Army’s southern front told the BBC that Britain was focusing on the wrong enemy. “The Assad regime is the cancer which Isis grow out of. So without erasing Assad from power ... that will not make a big difference. Daesh [Isis] and Assad are two faces of one coin (www.independent.co.uk/...).”
Other reactions are critical … the obvious question is what will these bombings serve? How will bombings from the air defeat a force on the ground? If there is going to be a ground war which groups will wage this war? Certainly none of the Western Imperialist countries want to actually put troops on the ground for many reasons. Will it be the Kurds, the Syrian Army, the opposition to Assad? Who? This tactic has not been working at all for the western imperialist powers … the Kurds will protect their people, but they probably will not be willing to conquer the whole of Syria and they will not serve Assad or the US and Europe.
Bombings themselves cannot defeat Daesh. If you bomb cities or villages they hold, inevitably, civilians will be (and have been) killed and honestly it may win Daesh further support, so they actually could undermine the struggle against Daesh. What about Bashir al Assad? Are the western imperialist countries planning on propping Assad up like the Russians are doing? My question is what was the sense in Daesh’s bombing of the Russian airliner, they were not bombing Daesh at the time, they were after Assad’s opponents, so where was the sense in that?
What is the Turkish government up to? They are far more comfortable with Daesh and hate the idea of an autonomous Kurdistan. They have succoured Islamacist groups in Syria with money, arms, and support and have enabled Daesh to recruit fighters and access armaments. Bringing down a Russian military jet was adding fuel to the fire … was it a diversion, an attempt to provide an additional foreign enemy for the Turkish people? The only thing that we do know that Erdoğan is up to is that he wants to get rid of Assad (that is why they have been helping Islamacist groups) and he desperately wants to eliminate what he sees as a threat coming from the Kurds whether political or military (that is behind the attacks of the last few years and which are currently continuing against the HDP and PKK). For Erdoğan and his cronyies, the Kurds are the greater danger. But, the west is hoping to use the Kurds in their struggle against Daesh … there is probably a serious contradiction brewing and the Turks are not indispensable … but the day after the bombing of the Russian jet, the EU gives €3 billion (£2 billion) to Turkey to stem the tide of refugees heading into Europe (so much for moral obligations to refugees)
Who speaks for the Syrians themselves who are trapped between Assad and Daesh and want nothing to do with either? What about them? Who represents these people at any supposed negotiations?
Where should the left stand? Well certainly not with the US and NATO, certainly not with Putin (this is just campism, Russia is not an ally in any senses and the days of the USSR have long passed, they are a Capitalist imperialist power), certainly not with Assad (who has murdered far more of “his people” than Daesh), not with Daesh (they are a reactionary force whose beliefs are in complete opposition to everything we on the left should be standing for and only the naïve believe that the enemy of my enemy is my friend; they are all enemies for the left and we must treat them as enemies) …
So we should be opposing the bombing of Syria (by everyone), we should be exposing Assad as the murderer he is, we need to support the Kurds who are facing attack from Turkey and from Daesh, we must oppose Daesh, and we cannot support Russia, the US, Europe and NATO.
This is a clash of barbarisms … standing in solidarity with the people of Syria who are facing death from above and death on the ground and standing for the right of self-defence and self-determination for the Kurds are the only options …
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