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Middle East

I hope that Syria realises that its future does not lie with the present regime in Iran, which is not a popular regime inside Iran. It is involved in some pretty despicable activities, of which the arming of Hezbollah is just one. I am glad to hear the hon. Gentleman say that Syria is examining its position carefully, as it should be doing so. It is a difficult position and has always been so. Part of the reason for all of these disputes is probably a weekend in Cairo in 1921 when Winston Churchill, along with his so-called ““experts””, drew up the borders in the first place, but we have to live with that. I have many friends back home in Wales, here in London and in all parts of the country who disagree profoundly and fundamentally with the Government’s foreign policy. Throughout my life, I have many times disagreed with the foreign policy that has been followed by our Government, but I do not strap explosives to my chest, go to the underground and murder 52 people. There can be no rationalisation for doing such a thing and to suggest one is nonsense. We cannot live with the idea that where someone feels passionately about something, they can have some kind of religious compunction to go out to murder people, whether on the streets of Kabul, Haifa, Karachi, Mumbai, Buenos Aires or Istanbul. We are a democratic society. It has taken many long, hard years of struggle to create the democratic institutions that we have in this country. The idea that we should back down and say, ““They are very passionate about this, therefore they should be allowed to murder other people”” is completely beyond me and we should resist it—