John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, admitted that Mr Corbyn’s election as Labour leader had been a “massive cultural shock” to many MPs, but he insisted “there is no going back”.
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Mr Corbyn watched 66 of his MPs vote with the Conservative Government to bomb Syria after he allowed them a free vote to defy his own anti-war message, but faces a challenge imposing party discipline as an MP who defied the Labour whip over 500 times before becoming leader.
A spokesman for Mr Corbyn told HuffPost UK: “The anti-war movement has been a vital, democratic campaign, which organised the biggest demonstrations in British history and has repeatedly called it right over 14 years of disastrous wars in the wider Middle East”.
Jeremy Corbyn has launched a strong defence of the Stop the War Coalition describing them as “a vital democratic campaign” as he rejected a call by the former shadow education secretary Tristram Hunt to pull out of a Christmas fundraising event.
“We’ve also seen some pretty ugly comments from them about Hilary Benn and the fact that Hilary Benn should be sacked”.
‘They are a really disreputable organisation and I would hope that Jeremy would step back and not go to their fundraiser’.
A Stop The War statement said: “Tristram Hunt’s attack is unfounded and unjustified”.
Stella Creasy, who has said her staff were scared to leave her constituency office in Walthamstow in the run-up to the Syria vote because of demonstrations against her support for military action, is due address a meeting of residents later on Sunday to explain her decision.
But last night a spokesman for Mr Corbyn said he would ignore the demand, saying the group’s protests were “at the heart of democracy”. “We look forward to celebrating that fact with Jeremy (Corbyn) this week”.
It has also caused outrage with comments following the Paris terror attacks suggesting the city had “reaped the whirlwind” for Western actions in the Middle East and comparing jihadists to the International Brigade volunteers who fought fascism in the Spanish Civil War.
“Now Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership has been strengthened”, said Mr McDonnell, writing in The Observer.
“The new leader was also elected with an overwhelming mandate on a political programme that seeks to take the party in a direction that reflects the current views of party members”, he wrote.
Mr Corbyn was a founder member of Stop the War, formed by various Left-wing groups after the September 11 attacks in the United States to oppose the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
While it is reported that Corbyn has no interest in pursuing a vendetta against those who voted for airstrikes, he wants to see coherence in the cabinet, having been boosted by the Oldham West win.
“We did not picket Labour Party offices, we have unequivocally condemned the bad massacre in Paris, and we do not take a view on who should hold which office in the Labour Party”.
Despite being forced to grant a free vote in the Commons debate on Syria because of a threatened shadow cabinet revolt, he still saw most members of his top team and the majority of Labour MPs vote with him in opposing military action.
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Asked about the Christmas fundraiser, Ms Nandy told BBC Radio 5 Live’s Pienaar’s Politics: “I can’t tell him what he should do with his diary”.
