WOT A LOVERLY DAY FOR A WAR

Letter from London (David Byers, Jerusalem Post, November 6th, 2005)

Tony Blair's hints of military action against Iran last week brought out further splits at the heart of the Labor Party over the Middle East, Israel and terrorism.

During a week of crisis for the British prime minister, in which Blair was forced to accept the resignation of his staunch ally David Blunkett as work and pensions secretary after a scandal over his business interests, several backbench Labor MPs tore into Blair's Middle Eastern policies.

The MPs fear that their leader, viewed by many within his party as a political conservative leading a predominantly leftist party, was planning for another Anglo-American conflict in the region, this time against Iran.

After Iranian President Ahmad Ahmadinejad's demand for Israel to be "wiped off the map," Blair held a barnstorming press conference last weekend in which he labelled the comments "a disgrace," added that they "revolted" him, and warned that Iran would soon be considered "a real threat to our world security and stability."

The attack drew immediate comparisons among skeptical Labor MPs with many such verbal tirades before the 2003 Iraq invasion and last week in the House of Commons, the prime minister faced intense pressure from MPs determined to stop any further military action before it had even started.

Labor MP Ken Purchase drew prominent nods of approval from his party colleagues at last Wednesday's Prime Minister's Questions as he warned Blair: "The people of this country are in no mood for a military adventure in Iran."

No one was iin much of a mood in 1939 either.