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Thursday 03 Dec 2015 - 12:15 Makkah mean time-21-2-1437
London, (IINA) - British lawmakers voted by a wide margin on Wednesday to join the international campaign of airstrikes against ISIS in Syria, after Prime Minister David Cameron asserted that bombing the “medieval monsters” in their heartland would make Britain safer, The Columbian reported.
According to Reuters, British bombers made their first strikes on Syria on Thursday, just hours after Britain's parliament voted to target Islamic State targets in Syria.
The vote, which stood at 397 in favor, 223 against, came after an emotional 10½-hour debate in which Cameron said that Britain must strike the militants in their heartland and not “sit back and wait for them to attack us”.
Those who were against taking part in military campaign argued that Britain’s entry into Syria’s crowded airspace would make little difference, and said Cameron’s military plan was based on wishful thinking that overlooked the messy reality of the Syrian civil war.
Cameron had long wanted to target ISIS in Syria, but had been unsure of getting majority support in the House of Commons since he suffered defeat in 2013 when lawmakers rejected a motion backing attacks on the forces of the leader of Syrian Regime Bashar Al-Assad.
However, the mood has changed after ISIS attacked Paris on November 13 and caused the deaths of 130 people.
Both France and the US have urged Britain to join their air campaign in Syria, and Cameron said Britain should not let its allies down. He said Britain was already a top target for ISIS attacks, and airstrikes would reduce the group’s ability to plan more Paris-style carnage.
“Do we work with our allies to degrade and destroy this threat and do we go after these terrorists in their heartlands, from where they are plotting to kill British people?” he said. “Or do we sit back and wait for them to attack us?”
He said that attacking ISIS was not anti-Muslim but “a defense of Islam” against “women-raping, Muslim-murdering, medieval monsters”.
Cameron was backed by most members of his ruling Conservative Party, which holds 330 of the 650 Commons seats, as well as members of the smaller Liberal Democrat party and others.
Labour, the main opposition, was divided. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who represents the left-wing of the party, spoke against what he called a “reckless and half-baked intervention”. However, more than 60 Labour lawmakers, including senior party figures, voted in support of airstrikes.
Labour foreign affairs spokesman Hilary Benn said Britain could not “walk by on the other side of the road” when international allies were asking for help against ISIS “fascists”.
British officials say Royal Air Force Typhoon and Tornado fighter jets, armed with Brimstone missiles capable of hitting moving targets, would bring the campaign highly accurate firepower and help minimize civilian casualties.
It is noteworthy that Britain already conducts airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq, but it did not interfere with ISIS forces in Syria until Thursday’s airstrikes.
Labour’s Shabana Mahmood, one of the few Muslim lawmakers in Parliament, called ISIS “Nazi-esque totalitarians who are outlaws from Islam”, but said that she opposed the strikes, saying: “We cannot simply bomb the ground, we have to have a strategy to hold it as well”.
Cameron answered that doing nothing was a worse option. “The risks of inaction are greater than the risks of what I propose”.
AG/IINA
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