The attacks in Syria are absolutely connected to the conflict in Israel. Iran has said that attacking US military installations in the region will continue as long as the US continues to support Israel against the Palestinians.

In the 1980s the presence of US military bases in the UK caused such revulsion that there were huge demonstrations at the bases (I went on several of them, with several Labour MPs also present) and there was a women's camp for years at the Greenham Common nuclear weapons US base which Mrs Steve and I also supported, which, arguably, changed the face of peace protests in this country. And we were your allies. The US has precious few enthusiastic allies in the Middle East and its presence in the form of military bases is a provocation, a running sore to many. The claim that the US has to strike back "in self-defence" by bombing weapons dumps in Syria would be laughable if it wasn't so serious. The US is there to protect its own interests, and its biggest interest in the region is propping up Israeli regimes, however bad they are, and there have been none worse than this one.