New Internationalism

"Phyllis Bennis of the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies said the West really should do nothing but listen to the people they've ignored for 35 years in exchange for so-called 'stability' in the region.

"She dismissed the idea that extremist groups are gaining ground and said she is appalled by calls for stability at any cost.

"'What (the West) should be doing is taking their hands off,' she said. 'For so many years they have interfered in that region...They have supported the most autocratic and repressive regimes.'"

"For a start, she said, the U.S. could stop giving $1.5 billion a year in military aid to the Egyptian government, adding the tear gas being used against protesters was manufactured at a factory in Pennsylvania."

"Phyllis Bennis, director of the New Internationalism Project at the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies, told IPS the recent announcements are an important indicator of the increasing engagement of Latin America within the broader issue of Israeli occupation and the Middle East.

"She said none of these countries were among the 100 or so states that recognised Palestine as a state, following the 1988 Declaration of Independence.

"'And most of them at that time were still governed by either U.S.-backed military dictatorships or early post- dictatorship neo-liberal governments that were still dependent on Washington,'" said Bennis, who has written extensively on the Palestinian issue and is author of Challenging Empire: How People, Governments and the U.N. Defy U.S. Power.'"

"This Sunday on BookTV’s In Depth, writer, analyst, and activist Phyllis Bennis Studies joins our three-hour live program to take viewers’ calls, emails and tweets on the Middle East situation, U.S. and U.N. foreign policy toward the region and military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

"Ms. Bennis is the author of numerous books, including 'Before & After: U.S. Foreign Policy and the September 11th Crisis' and 'Understanding the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict: A Primer.' She is the director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy and has been involved with in Middle East for many years."

"As Phyllis Bennis, a foreign policy analyst with the Institute of Policy Studies, put it: 'WikiLeaks isn't the Pentagon Papers, it is the raw materials the Pentagon used to write the Pentagon Papers. The challenge for civil society is to use this raw material to write our own Pentagon Papers.'"

"D'autant qu'elle intervient sous l'administration Obama 'qui avait promis une nouvelle approche des relations internationales,' rappelle Phyllis Bennis, chercheuse à l'Institute for policy studies. Pour l'auteur du livre, Calling the shots : How Washington dominates today's United Nations, 'la politique étrangère de Barack Obama s'inscrit dans la continuité de celle de George W. Bush, avec le même mépris, et non dans le changement annoncé.'"

The Post editorial board is absolutely right that the Obama administration should consider the $1 billion a year in U.S. aid to Egypt in the context of Egypt's domestic repression and the role of its military, and that Congress should "link military funds to human rights, as it has for several democracies that are U.S. allies" ["Mr. Mubarak vs. Mr. Obama," editorial, Nov. 27]. And yes, President Obama should "make it clear that he will not be dismissed or pushed around" by regional leaders.

Shall I assume The Post's next lead editorial will say the same thing about the $3 billion in military aid (and potentially $3 billion more in "incentives") that the Obama administration will give to Israel this year?

Despite the promises of President Obama's administration that he would carry out a new kind of engagement with the world, what we are seeing is a very long standing, old-fashioned kind of engagement that does not illustrate a committment to a new foreign policy.