‘Air strikes against IS in Syria to make Britain safer’: Cameron

The Royal Air Force is now a part of a US-led coalition to hit ISIS in Iraq but not in on actions against terrorists in Syria.

British Prime Minister David Cameron said that British air strikes against Islamic State (IS) targets in Syria will make his country safer.

“If they had their way, it would be London”, said Cameron.

The initial objective is to damage ISIL and reduce its capacity to do us harm and I believe that this can in time lead to its eradication, he told lawmakers at the debate.

It will leave British citizens and our homeland more exposed, more vulnerable, and it will significantly damage Britain’s reputation as a reliable ally and partner in the world, Hammond said.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, in a letter to his MPs, has reiterated his opposition to the airstrikes in Syria, British media reported on Friday.

The Scottish National Party’s Angus Robertson said his legislators would not support airstrikes without effective ground support and “a fully costed reconstruction and stability plan”.

His intervention comes one day after the Prime Minister set out his case for airstrikes to MPs, warning them that Britain is at risk of attack and insisting the military operations to defeat IS can not be left to other countries.

Some Labour lawmakers agree with Cameron, who must convince some opposition members and several skeptical lawmakers in his own party if he is to win a parliamentary majority for widening the air campaign against IS.

“Germany will be a more active contributor than it has been until now”, Henning Otte, defence expert for the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) said in a statement on Thursday.

Fiona McTaggart, MP for Slough, said Mr Corbyn’s leadership had been “weak”. “You can not have a shadow cabinet voting down the leader of the Labor Party who has just been elected with the biggest mandate in history”.

Labour’s leader is struggling to contain a revolt after saying he could not support RAF action against IS.

Mr Watson hinted a free vote – allowing the shadow cabinet and Labour MPs to vote as they please – might be the best way out of the situation.

And he accused Mr Corbyn and his supporters of mounting an “attempted coup”.

He could even face resignations from his shadow cabinet, BBC News has reported. Cameron said that Britain needs “to take action now, to help protect us against the terrorism seen on the streets of Paris and elsewhere”.

“We do not have the luxury of being able to wait until the Syrian conflict is resolved before tackling ISIL (Islamic State)”, Cameron wrote in a response to parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, which had said a policy to extend air strikes was “incoherent” without a strategy to defeat the militants.

John Spellar, the Labour MP for Warley was asked on BBC 5 Live Breakfast this morning what he thought about Corbyn’s decision to send the letter.