There was anger among some Labour MPs after Mr Corbyn issued a letter following Thursday’s meeting saying the Prime Minister had failed to make a “convincing case” and that he could not support further military intervention.
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JEREMY Corbyn is facing a dramatic showdown with his own shadow cabinet after insisting he has the final decision on whether Labour opposes airstrikes in Syria.
But a senior source confirmed that a free vote would be offered, as the shadow cabinet gathered in Westminster to discuss an issue which has exposed deep rifts at the heart of the party.
In an article for Huffington Post, Mr McCluskey – who endorsed Mr Corbyn’s bid for the leadership but has since criticised his performance – made clear that he thought David Cameron’s plan to extend air strikes from Iraq to Syria was “illegal and irrational”.
John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, Tom Watson, the deputy leader, and Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, all want Mr Corbyn to give his MPs a free vote. We will have a further discussion on this.
Mr Corbyn said he had received 70,000 responses to a survey sent out to Labour supporters on Friday canvassing their opinions, and a decision would be taken “as a party”.
Ahead of a potentially explosive meeting of the shadow cabinet, Diane Abbott said “the party as a whole” is opposed to the bombing and “looking to Jeremy to show leadership”.
“Who do these people think they are?”
The Labour leader, who has spent the last couple of days amassing evidence of grass roots support for his position, is expected to deliver a riposte to critics in a high-profile interview.
“At this point, I do not believe that bombing Syria will make it safe, any more than bombing Iraq made Iraq safe, bombing Afghanistan made Afghanistan safe and bombing Libya made Libya safe. The result was a very, very clear mandate for me to be leader of the party”. He could issue a whip to his MPs to vote against Mr. Cameron’s proposal, or allow each to vote on his/her conscience.
Asked if there was any chance divisions in the party could force his resignation, Mr Corbyn said: “I’m not going anywhere. We have shared the information that we had, and Kezia also doesn’t think that the case has been made for air strikes on Syria”.
Mr Corbyn also said headlines about him being against a shoot-to-kill policy in the event of a terror attack had been “spun” in the media which was a “regret”.
Defence Secretary Michael Fallon told the same programme he had been briefing Labour MPs on military action, but stressed the Government does “not yet” have enough votes to back airstrikes. “I’m enjoying every moment of it”, he asserted.
“I fear we may be playing right into what they want – bombing more civilians and therefore helping them recruit more desperate young men with no other way in responding in their grief than by fighting back”.
If Mr Corbyn imposes a three-line-whip compelling MPs to oppose bombing his frontbench opponents have said they plan to resign en masse and put down a vote of no confidence to the Parliamentary Labour Party.
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The rally was against a planned vote in Parliament about whether to support a motion for the United Kingdom to starting bombing Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) militants in Syria.
