Jew World Order

Christof Lehmann (nsnbc) : Jeremy Corbyn is facing a quagmire with regard to the UK Parliament’s vote on expanding the UK’s intervention in Syria. With several of Labour’s shadow cabinet members likely to vote in favor of the intervention, the test for Corbyn and for Labour is whether the party displays honesty with regard to the UK’s role in manufacturing the war in Syria, the function and the legality of British airstrikes.

Left of centre. EPA/Will Oliver

Jeremy Corbyn and Labour are facing a quagmire that could either make or break Corbyn and Labour’s growth-trend. The vital question for Labour is whether it can overcome a false a priori condemnation vs. an a priori endorsement of airstrikes in Syria and whether Corbyn and Labour can find a political line that is based on Realpolitik. That is, a policy that is based on emphasizing Britain’s role in manufacturing the war in Syria and a demand that any intervention would have to be based in international law.

Corbyn and many of his supporters have painted themselves into a corner by condemning airstrikes as both politically and morally wrong. There is, however, also a general consensus among Labour that the UK should participate in combating the Islamic State (ISIS, ISIL, Daesh), and many Labour MPs are likely to vote in favor of expanding the UK’s participation in airstrikes.

Some analysts suggest that the majority of Labour MPs will be voting in favor. Among those in Labour’s shadow cabinet who are likely to vote in favour of Cameron’s proposal are shadow Lord Chancellor Falconer, Deputy Leader Tom Watson and shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn. Corbyn, for his part, attempted to tackle the situation by addressing the party as a whole by writing a letter to all Labour MPs, stressing that Prime Minister David Cameron had not explained how the UK’s participation and additional airstrikes would improve the situation in Syria.

Corbyn’s quagmire? He lacks front-bench support. Labour risks its growth-trend and support from young, new Labour members if the party votes in favor of the Cameron Cabinet’s proposal. Corbyn and Labour have painted themselves into a corner, a lose-lose situation that can only be overcome by swapping a priori positions with much-needed honesty and Realpolitik.

The Only Way In Is The Only Way Out.

Corbyn and Labour have one option that would get them out of the quagmire, weaken Cameron and his cabinet, further strengthen the party as well as Britain’s standing among “law-abiding” States. This strategy would have to involve a number of points, including:

Honesty about the UK’s role in manufacturing the war in Syria. Senior Statesman and former French Foreign Minister Roland Dumas and his statements pertaining the UK’s role could be helpful. In June 2013 Dumas appeared in a televised interview on the French Channel LPC, saying:

“I am going to tell you something. I was in England two years before the violence in Syria on other business. I met with top British officials, who confessed to me, that they were preparing something in Syria. … This was in Britain not in America. Britain was organizing an invasion of rebels into Syria. They even asked me, although I was no longer Minister of Foreign Affairs, if I would like to participate. Naturally, I refused, I said I am French, that does not interest me. … This operation goes way back. It was prepared, preconceived and planned… in the region it is important to know that this Syrian regime has a very anti-Israeli stance. … Consequently, everything that moves in the region…- and I have this from a former Israeli Prime Minister who told me ´we will try to get on with our neighbors but those who don´t agree with us will be destroyed. It is a type of politics, a view of history, why not after all. But one should  know about it”.

The question for Corbyn and for Labour as whole is whether they can find a consensus based on honesty about the UK’s role in manufacturing the war in Syria. Basing Labour policy on such honesty would significantly strengthen Labour and deal a blow to Cameron et al. Failure to do so can potentially bust Labour, weaken Corbyn and put Labour, once again, into the category of parties whose policies are populist hot air balloons that burst once the party has won elections.

Honesty about the Function and Legality of Airstrikes instead of A Priori Positioning. Corbyn and his supporters would not need to condemn UK airstrikes in Syria, politically and morally, if the party was honest about the functions of these airstrikes and their legality. UK airstrikes and airstrikes carried out by other members of the US-led, so-called coalition against ISIS have hardly weakened the self-proclaimed Islamic State.

Airstrikes aimed at closing Syria’s and Iraq’s borders to Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the Israeli occupied Syrian Golan could have stopped the logistic supply lines of ISIS, Jabhat Al-Nusrah and other Jihadi franchises within a few months and stopped ISIS’s oil export from Syria via northern Iraq and Turkey.

U.S. Senator John McCain meeting illegally in a rebel safe house with the heads of the “Free Syrian Army” in Idlib, Syria in April, 2013. In the left foreground, top al Qaeda terrorist leader Ibrahim al-Badri (aka Al-Baghdadi of ISIS, aka Caliph Ibrahim of the recently founded Islamic Empire) with whom the Senator is talking. Behind Badri is visible Brigadier General Salim Idris (with glasses), the former military chief of the FSA, who has since fled to the Gulf states after the collapse of any semblance of the FSA. (Courtesy VoltaireNet.org)

It is worth recalling that the EU, on April 22, 2013, lifted its ban on the import of Syrian oil from “rebel-held territories”. Corbyn and Labour have the possibility to continue painting themselves into corners or to challenge Cameron’s cabinet to specify, exactly, how additional UK airstrikes should be carried out so as not to continue the failed policy that has cost hundreds of thousands of lives, displaced millions, supports radical Islamist insurgencies, and is illegal.

Finally, Corbyn and Labour will lose credibility and lose out to Cameron et al. unless Corbyn and Labour challenge Cameron with regard to the legality of UK airstrikes in Syria.

It is a question about the primacy of airstrikes being “politically and morally right or wrong” vs. the UK having to “adhere to international law”. International law provides only two legal (not to be confused with legitimate) authorizations for airstrikes in Syria.

The one would be airstrikes that are carried out on the basis of a unanimous UN Security Council resolution. The second would be airstrikes on invitation of the government of the Syrian Arab Republic. A debate about moral or political principles rather than a debate about how to legally conduct airstrikes that target Al-Qaeda and ISIS franchises is bound to put Corbyn and Labour on a lame horse that is easily recognized as such by many of the new, young Labour members who know that information can be found in other media than the guardian or the BBC.

CH/L – nsnbc 28.11.2015