JEREMY CORBYN has laid down a challenge to hawkish Labour MPs ahead of two crunch meetings over Syria today, saying they must listen to party members before voting. 

The Labour leader revealed over 70,000 members have responded to an unprecedented snap consultation over air strikes since Friday. 

The results, which were still being analysed by staff last night, will be presented to meetings of the shadow cabinet and Parliamentary Labour Party being held today. 

Mr Corbyn said he “understands dissent” and respects the different views held by MPs, but also stressed party members “must have a voice.” 

He said: “Surely we must recognise that in a democracy, the Labour Party has a very large membership — nearly 400,000 members — and they have a right to express their point of view.

“MPs have to listen to it and try to understand what’s going on in the minds of ordinary party members.”

A survey of 2,453 of the party’s supporters by Labour List staged in the wake of the Paris terror attacks found 63 per cent oppose air strikes. 

The Labour leader fought his corner in a calm and confident TV interview yesterday after facing a deluge of friendly fire last week. 

Right-wing Labour MP John Spellar called Mr Corbyn “the Fuhrer” and said an email to MPs setting out his objections to bombing amounted to a “coup” against the shadow cabinet. 

Responding, Mr Corbyn said: “What I’ve done is what I said I would always do — try to democratise the way the party does things.”

Unite general secretary Len McCluskey attacked Mr Corbyn’s critics, branding them “Westminster bubble dwellers.”

He said: “The thought that some Labour MPs might be prepared to play intra-party politics over an issue such as this will sicken all decent people.”

Mr Corbyn insisted he was not a pacifist as he made the case for a political solution in Syria on the Andrew Marr show.

But he warned the fourth British intervention in the Middle East since the turn of the century could help Islamic State.

He said: “There has to be a recognition that if we bomb in Raqqa we’re actually going to take out civilian lives. We would not in effect do very much damage to Isis and actually may make the situation worse not better.”

The Muslim Council of Britain also warned yesterday that bombing would provide cover for Isis’s “vile ideology.”

President Dr Omer El-Hamdoon said: “The last thing the British people need is another engagement which will cost billions of taxpayer’s money which the government continuously claims is unavailable for basic services, countless civilian lives claimed in Syria which will create new recruits for the likes of Daesh (Isis), British casualties and a new wave of violence and terrorism in an already dangerously volatile region.”

Tory Defence Secretary Michael Fallon revealed he had personally been briefing Labour MPs on the legality and effectiveness of air strikes over the weekend. But he admitted that the government did “not yet” have a guaranteed majority and no vote has yet been called.

Former shadow business secretary Chuka Umunna said yesterday that he would vote for bombing even if it means breaking the Labour whip.

But Labour MPs Jess Phillips, Liam Byrne and Stephen Kinnock, who are not natural allies of Mr Corbyn, all came out against air strikes.