War and Peace in the Middle East

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War and Peace in the Middle East

By Political Affairs

An Interview with Phyllis Bennis

Editor’s Note: Phyllis Bennis is an internationally recognized expert on the Middle East, a Fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies, a founder of United for Peace and Justice, and the author of Before and After: US Foreign Policy and the September 11th Crisis (New York, Olive Branch Press).

PA: Can you talk about the "wave of democracy" in the Middle East that is supposed to have occurred as a result of Bush’s war on Iraq?

PB: Well, you read about it as a result of Bush’s war on Iraq. It’s not democracy because of Bush’s war on Iraq. The opposition movements in places like Egypt and other places around the region have been in place for a quarter of a century or more. The notion that the Egyptians started worrying about democracy once Bush invaded Iraq is the worst kind of arrogance of this illegal US invasion. These are long-standing movements.

What is true is the invasion did change the political dynamics in the region. It made some regimes that have long been dependent on US largesse – both political and economic – to at least go through some motions of listening to some of the democratic movements in their countries. If that continues, obviously it’s a good thing. There is no indication that it will, because there is no indication that the Bush administration has any intention of actually changing its position vis-à-vis these regimes. For example, in Egypt, where there’s been an active opposition movement for a quarter of a century, many political prisoners are still in prison being tortured, being disappeared, etc. The Bush administration came out in defense of one such prisoner who was rapidly released. That was Ayman Noor, whose political party (it is a new party), is an important part of the opposition in terms of the fight around civil and political rights. It also cannot be ignored that his party stands for business interests, free trade, it’s pro-business, pro-American, pro-privatization of the Egyptian economy, even though it does play an important role on the political right side of things.

So it’s not surprising that that was who the Bush administration endorsed as their political prisoner poster child. They said nothing about the hundreds, maybe thousands, of political prisoners that have been languishing in Egyptian prisons for a very long time. Whether there’s any intention of actually holding the Egyptian regime accountable for those denials of civil and political rights, we don’t know. The US has not made any move, for example, to condition the $2 billion a year it sends in direct aid to Egypt on acceptance of civil and political rights. If they did that would be a good thing, but there is not indication that they intend to do that.

http://www.politicalaffairs.net/article/articleview/1155/1/98/