Phyllis Bennis
Fellow Phyllis Bennis is in charge of the New Internationalism Project at IPS. The Middle East component of the Project challenges the drive towards U.S. empire in that region and beyond, focusing particularly on ending the U.S. war and occupation in Iraq, and supporting a just and comprehensive peace based on an end to Israeli occupation of Palestine. The United Nations component analyzes U.S. domination of the UN and attempts to strengthen the potential role of the UN as part of a new internationalism and the global resistance to empire. Since September 11, 2001, the New Internationalism Project has also been involved in assessing the root causes of, and critiquing Bush administration responses to, that tragedy.
Phyllis is also a fellow of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam. She has been a writer, analyst, and activist on Middle East and UN issues for many years. While working as a journalist at the United Nations during the run-up to the 1990-91 Gulf War, she began working on U.S. domination of the UN, and stayed involved in work on Iraq sanctions and disarmament, and later U.S. war and occupation in Iraq. In 1999, Phyllis accompanied a group of congressional aides to Iraq to examine the impact of U.S.-led economic sanctions on humanitarian conditions there, and later joined former UN Assistant Secretary General Denis Halliday, who resigned his position as Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq to protest the impact of sanctions, in a speaking tour. In 2001 she helped found and currently co-chairs the U.S. Campaign to End Israeli Occupation. She works closely with the United for Peace and Justice anti-war coalition, and since 2002 has played an active role in the growing global peace movement.
Recent Work
Talking Points
Netanyahu Speaks: The Israel-Palestine Ball Remains in Obama's Court
June 16 - The Israeli prime minister's speech responding to U.S. wishes for the region amounted to little more than rhetorical change.
Commentary
Obama in Egypt: Changing the Discourse
June 4 - Obama's approach toward the Muslim world may be diplomatic but there needs to be more action. Published in Common Dreams and Foreign Policy In Focus and Right Web: Political Research Associates.
Commentary
Netanyahu at the White House: Not Yet Change We Can Believe In
May 20 - The reality of power – that the U.S. is still the financial, military, diplomatic and political superpower patron on which Israel depends – was not reflected in the press conference that followed the meeting. Published in Common Dreams and YES! Magazine.