Maajid Nawaz Knows Precisely Why May Is Right And Corbyn Is Wrong On Syria
14 April 2018, 15:38 | Updated: 14 April 2018, 16:47
Maajid Nawaz challenged the question critics, including Jeremy Corbyn, are asking in response to Theresa May's decision to join France and the United States in targeting the Syrian regime's chemical weapons infrastructure.
The Labour leader called the Prime Minister's decision "legally challenging" and means that accountability for war crimes and use of chemical weapons is "less likely" as a result of the airstrike.
Maajid Nawaz opposed the criticism by arguing that inaction can also lead to immoral outcomes.
"If it has been demonstrated that they were indeed behind this beyond reasonable doubt, then the question should not be whether we respond, but how to respond" he said.
"At the end of the day, moral culpability lies not only in taking action that may lead to deaths, it can also lie with inaction and to watch as people are murdered on mass and to stand by and to pontificate and wonder what your responsibilities or duties indeed are.
"Action and inaction can both lead to grossly immoral outcomes.
"And so guess what, leadership is tough.
"That's the difference between trying to formulate one's views based upon principle and a commitment to those principles and being a weathervane and going where the wind flows.
"Because that's the difference between being a populist, which I believe is precisely what Jeremy Corbyn is."
