Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras “threw down the gauntlet” to his party’s dissenters on Thursday, with government sources leaking his particularly severe statements to the press in the evening, following a meeting with top aides and ministers.

Using the familiar “non paper” route, Tsipras first referred to a SYRIZA Parliament group meeting on Wednesday before a crucial vote on an agreement with creditors, asking if there were “alternative proposals” to avoid the “blackmailing dilemma we face”?

According to reports, Tsipras asked his party’s MPs if the “blackmail” — alluding to the risk of Grexit unless creditors’ demands were met — was real or bogus?

“…If bogus, then we should all vote ‘no’. If, however, we decide it is real, we must all share the responsibility. The fact that no substantive or documented objections were raised over the real force of the blackmail renders the choice of 32 deputies of our Parliament group not to share the responsibility — with me, personally, as well as the other 110 deputies of SYRIZA — a choice that comes into conflict with the principles of solidarity, and during a critical time, thus creating an open wound (in our party’s ranks)…”