ISIL in Syria

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Nusrat Ghani (Wealden) (Con)]

There has been a great deal of talk about our solidarity with our French allies following the horrific events in Paris. While it is all very well metaphorically to stand alongside our allies, we make a mockery of solidarity if we refuse to fly alongside them in the skies over Syria. More than that, we make a mockery of our own credibility if we ignore UN Security Council resolution 2249, which has been secured unanimously. Having called upon the world community to take action, and given the comprehensive and strategic argument that the Prime Minister has put forward, we cannot ignore that call and expect our international partners to look at us with any shred of respect or good will. How can we ourselves have any self-respect if we leave this fight to brave Kurdish women fighting with antiquated weapons?

However, this issue is not all about national pride, living up to our responsibilities or our own self-respect; it is about keeping British people safe—those at risk of being murdered by terrorists and those at risk of being brainwashed into joining them—and we are already doing that. I welcome the Prime Minister’s announcement that £5 million will go towards the establishment of a new Commonwealth unit to counter extremism, and his announcement today of a comprehensive review to root out those funding extremists in the UK.

According to Oxford University’s Professor Scott Atran, 95% of Daesh recruits are signed up by friends and family, and there are few things more dangerous than misfits who feel they can live outside the law being recruited by the lure of Daesh. It is one of the most barbaric and strategically dangerous enemies we have ever faced. Its ability to recruit ordinary westerners, its commitment to transforming them into murderers and suicide bombers, and its lack of mercy to any man, woman or child are unparalleled. It rapes, enslaves and decapitates. Its victims are Muslims, Kurds, Yazidis, Syrian, French and British. Committing acts of atrocity is how it sustains its image of invincibility, and its growth depends on a steady beat of battlefield victories, with looting along the way. It craves headlines that reinforce its apocalyptic propaganda—so much so that the manager of an electronics store in Raqqa said that Daesh loses popularity among ordinary, uneducated people when it loses its brilliant victories. For me, that is at the heart of this argument.

The very destruction of the caliphate state is in itself the right thing to do, because its existence, along with its self-proclaimed caliph and the nonsense that it has fulfilled Wahabi prophecy, makes up its ideology.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

I am enjoying listening to my hon. Friend develop her points. Does she agree that the motion is not about military action alone and in isolation, but about a broader strategy?

[Nusrat Ghani]

Indeed. Tonight’s motion is not just about military intervention, but about humanitarian and diplomatic relations.

We must break the umbilical cord that acts as an anchor from Raqqa and offers the seduction of salvation and destruction to the already damaged minds of westerners and middle easterners alike. Until we can demonstrate that we can scar and humiliate Daesh, we will not be taken seriously by those who are attracted to doing its bidding. Raqqa is its command and control centre. It is from there that it plans its trilogies of terror: to control parts of Syria and Iraq; to establish wilayats, or provinces, like the ones that have already been declared in Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Nigeria, Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Afghanistan and Pakistan; and, closer to home, to create command and control cells in Europe.

Caliphates cannot exist as underground movements because they are founded on territorial authority, so to destroy the caliphate and its pull, we must take away its command of territory. To do that we must take military action, because those in Daesh cannot be negotiated with. They are not going to sit at a table and agree a 10-point plan for a political settlement, so the fight has to be taken to them, but I have not met anyone opposed to airstrikes who is willing to go over and negotiate with them. We have nothing they want: they want only our demise. They recently said:

“We will conquer your Rome, break your crosses, and enslave your women”.

As a Muslim woman, I stand with people of all faiths who abhor Daesh’s ideology, rhetoric and actions. We are justified in taking action to destroy them: they are a threat and they will not rest until they have destroyed us and everything we stand for. For that reason, I will vote in favour of the Government’s motion this evening.