Britain votes on joining air strikes in Syria

What is more, almost 3000 coalition air strikes have already been aimed at Syria and the case for what British air strikes will add is weak.

Given Britain’s diminished role on the world stage, the victory hands Cameron the chance to restore Britain’s standing in global affairs. Now Britain and Germany will decide whether they will.

“Matters of national security are far too important to be bulldozed through the House of Commons for political convenience”, the spokesman said.

RAF jets are ready to launch air strikes in Syria “very quickly”, Philip Hammond said as Labour sources conceded MPs are set to back military action in a crucial Commons vote.

Cameron had previously used “ISIL” to refer to the extremist group, which is also known as “ISIS”, before switching to Daesh, which has negative connotations and is based on an Arabic acronym.

“We in Northern Ireland know what it’s like for terrorism to be ignored or appeased”.

“This is not about whether we want to fight terrorism, it’s about how best we do that”, Cameron said.

In a rare move, weekly Prime Minister’s Questions have been cancelled and the parliamentary diary cleared for an all-day debate on the Syria strikes, with a vote expected around 2200 GMT or even later. The West says Assad must go.

Despite opposing military intervention, Mr Corbyn gave Labour MPs a free vote on the issue.

Corbyn, a veteran anti-war campaigner who argued the bombing would be ineffective and kill civilians, was forced to allow his lawmakers to vote according to their conscience in order to quell a rebellion in his party over the military action. Mr Corbyn also urged the Prime Minister David Cameron to apologise, after he said MPs voting against the proposals to bomb Islamic State (IS) were “terrorist sympathisers”.

“The spectre of Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya looms over this debate”, Corbyn said, accusing Cameron of “an ill-thought-out rush to war”.

A YouGov opinion poll last week found that 59 percent approved of Britain joining air strikes in Syria, compared to 20 percent who disapproved, but a survey published on Wednesday showed only 48 percent approved with 31 percent against.

The vote is expected to last 10 hours and MPs will be asked whether the United Kingdom should join forces with allies including the USA, France and Russian Federation in bombing Isis targets in Raqqa, the Islamist group’s stronghold.

David Cameron said: “I believe the House has taken the right decision to keep the United Kingdom safe – military action in Syria as one part of a broader strategy”. Britain has ruled out sending troops, and critics of the government have responded with skepticism to Cameron’s claim that there are 70,000 moderate Syrian rebels on the ground.

The British debate comes as U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said the U.S. military will deploy a new special operations force to be sent to Iraq to step up the fight against the militants.