Iraq: Coalition Against ISIL

Shabana Mahmood Excerpts

Friday 26th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the debate today. I will support the motion before the House, but I do so with deep concern and real worry about the future. That is not because I do not want ISIL to be destroyed—I do—but because I believe that our history in Iraq, with the war of 2003, has eroded trust, created suspicion about our motives for getting involved and perhaps caused some of the factors that has led us to where we are today. Without genuine, prolonged efforts to achieve a political settlement, I have fears about where this may ultimately end. I am deeply concerned about the potential scale of civilian deaths that may occur, bearing in mind the scale of those that have already occurred and that are occurring even as we speak. Such decisions are deeply difficult—I often feel that we have to choose between the lesser of two evils—but a political solution is the only way to ensure that peace can be won and, in the end, that it can be a lasting peace.

The starting point for making my decision is that those in ISIL are fanatics and monsters; they are not Muslims. They have hijacked the name of Islam, the religion that I, as well as tens of thousands of my constituents and hundreds of thousands of British Muslims, follow and practice, and which we all love. They have hijacked and dishonoured the name of our religion. I am a Sunni Muslim, like the majority of British Muslims, and like them I abhor and am repulsed by the fact that those in ISIL describe themselves as true Sunni Muslims: they are not, and we reject them utterly.

[Stephen Doughty]

My hon. Friend is making a crucial point. Will she join me in welcoming the fact that in Cardiff, as well as in many communities throughout the UK, Muslim leaders from across the Muslim spectrum and leaders from other communities and faiths have come together to condemn ISIL’s activities not only in Iraq and Syria, but in recruiting and perverting young people in this country?

--- Later in debate ---

[Shabana Mahmood]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. The coming together of the wider community has been welcome and much needed. He also makes an important point about the radicalisation of young British Muslims. We must be alive to the risk that all this action might also create such radicalisation.

I have to say that the anger and hurt of the wider Muslim community both here and abroad is secondary to the pain, the death and the destruction that ISIL has visited on its victims, Muslim and non-Muslim alike. The rightful place for those in ISIL is behind bars or 6 foot under the earth.

What then should we do? In making my decision, I have taken into account both the nature of ISIL, which I have already set out, and the fact that the action we are being asked to approve is legal. Such action is at the request of a democratically elected Government, so the situation is very different in nature from that in 2003. A sovereign state has asked for help that we can provide, and we should therefore provide it. I do, however, have concerns. The Prime Minister gave assurances on some of the issues when he opened the debate, but we in this House should continue to press the Government on such matters.

My first concern relates to the Iraqi Government. The hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart) raised important and powerfully made points about the difficulty of the task. I am not under any illusions about how difficult it will be, but the Government must be one for all of Iraqi society, and one in which they all feel that they have a stake. Otherwise, there will be no future for Iraq as it currently exists. They will have to consider splitting it up into two or three countries, with each group being given its own homeland. If they do not want to break up, they will have to consider some sort of constitutional settlement involving a form of federation or on the basis of the kind of constitutional debates that we are now having about our future. They will have to come to a resolution, and we must support them in doing so.

The Iraqi army must demonstrate that it is willing and capable of protecting all Iraqis, including the Sunnis in the south of the country who are under attack from Shi’a militias. There must be even-handedness if we are to win the wider and harder battle for hearts and minds that has to be won. ISIL is presenting itself as the true protector of Sunni Muslims in that area, and we should tackle that head on, so the Iraqi army must be able to meet that call. If the Iraqi army and Government can demonstrate that they will protect and include all minorities, we can move a long way towards the stability needed both to win the fight before us today and, in the end, to win the peace.

I must give a note of caution about some of our coalition partners. It is welcome and important that they are all on board, but we cannot be blind to the regional dynamics that exist between the different groupings, and we must be alive to the risks that such dynamics pose. However, a sovereign state has asked for help, and I think that we must all answer that call.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—