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Livingstone: Push Out Labour Airstrikes MPs

Don Valley MP Caroline Flint said the man “swore repeatedly, called her and her staff member warmongers” and then hung up when he was asked for his name.

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Following Wednesday night’s vote, there were complaints by MPs of orchestrated email and social media campaigns to pressure them into opposing military action, even though they had been given a free vote.

“A buse and intimidation have no place in politics”, they said.

About the planned protest outside Creasy’s home, he said: “To use an issue of such importance to try and divide the Labour party is reprehensible”.

“It is very, very rare for MPs to applaud in the Commons but they applauded Benn because they recognised that this was something special (just as they applauded Robin Cook when he spoke against the Iraq war in 2003)”, he said.

Momentum was established to give a continued voice to the thousands of people who helped elect Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader after becoming registered supporters of the party and to ensure Mr Corbyn’s anti-austerity policy platform is maintained.

Labour deputy leader Tom Watson has declared that the pro-Corbyn campaign group Momentum is “a rabble” and “an irrelevance” to the party’s movement.

“The problem is, it seems only a part of those forces are moderate and there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that they would deploy as a unified army to counter Daesh”.

One shadow minister, Diana Johnson, who also voted against airstrikes, said she felt something more needed to be done by the Labour leadership to deal with online threats against MPs. Labour’s share of the vote increased by more than seven points to 62.1 per cent on a 2.27 per cent swing from Ukip.

Watson praised both McMahon and Corbyn – who will be given an important breathing space as he seeks to overcome divisions in the party – after the emphatic win.

After Corbyn’s snivelling appeal to the prime minister to do the right thing, Labour MP John Mann rose to attack Corbyn and demanded that he withdraw his criticisms of those in his party who were voting with the government.

“Stop the War will continue to hold to democratic account all those MPs who vote for war”.

The organisation – the successor group to Mr Corbyn’s leadership campaign – had little impact on Labour, he said.

Mr Livingstone, who was controversially put in charge of the party’s defence review, said if his MP had voted for airstrikes he would back a de-selection challenge.

The meeting was addressed by Labour’s Shadow Chancellor, who told the attendees there were “a small number” of Labour MPs “who can’t come to terms with Jeremy’s election, or a mass membership”.

“Across the House, I thought the speeches were excellent, I thought Jeremy was very careful in the way he approached it”, said McDonnell on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this morning.

The spokesman also said Momentum “strongly disapproves of anyone who engages in abusive behaviour towards MPs or anyone else, and threatening or bullying, whether they are outside the Labour party [as most are] or inside it”.

The disclosure comes after Bermondsey and Old Southwark MP Neil Coyle revealed he had been given police protection after receiving a death threat on Twitter when he voted for military action. It just means they’re regular people, who don’t really want to go out fighting for things every day.

But Labour MPs called for Mr Corbyn to publicly distance himself from Momentum. “I think they are a bit of an irrelevance in the debate”.

As Raqqa Is Slowly Dying’s Sarmad Al Jilane wrote in a blog post published Monday, the U.S.-led coalition already conducting airstrikes in Syria has made no progress against ISIS.

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“They hold us in contempt. They hold our values in contempt. They hold our belief in tolerance and decency in contempt”.

Hilary Benn