The United States imposed sanctions on Wednesday against Francesca Albanese, the United Nations (UN) special rapporteur on human rights for the Palestinian Territories, following her work investigating alleged abuses in the war between Israel and Hamas, according to US official sources.
The State Department, headed by Marco Rubio, announced the decision after several failed attempts to pressure the UN to remove Albanese from her post. The official, an Italian human rights lawyer, has called the Israeli military campaign in Gaza a"genocide" and urged the international community to impose sanctions against Israel. Both the Israeli and US governments have categorically rejected these accusations.
The sanctions against Albanese include asset freezes and the revocation of his visa to enter the United States.These measures are based on an executive order signed in February by President Donald Trump, targeting those who cooperate with the International Criminal Court (ICC) investigations into Israel. Rubio stated this Wednesday on his social media account X: “Albanese’s political and economic campaign against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated. We will always support our partners in their right to self-defense.”
The US Foreign Minister also accused her of"directly collaborating" with the ICC in issuing arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes in Gaza. According to Rubio, Albanese is"unfit" to serve as rapporteur: "She has expressed blatant anti-Semitism, support for terrorism, and open contempt for the United States, Israel, and the West."
In recent weeks, Albanese has urged various states to pressure Israel to halt its operations in Gaza and published reports recommending prosecutions against international firms allegedly benefiting from the war, including Blackrock and Vanguard, which he accuses of profiting from a"genocide economy."
The US actions are part of a nearly six-month campaign to mitigate criticism of Israel's handling of the war, which began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas terrorists attacked Israeli territory, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and capturing 251. The Israeli response has left more than 57,000 Palestinians dead, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which attributes most of the victims to women and children.
The conflict, which has raged on for nearly 21 months, has displaced most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people and severely hampered access to medical care. Albanese recently told X: “We must stop this genocide, whose short-term goal is to complete the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, while profiting from the machinery of death designed to carry it out. No one is safe until everyone is safe.”
The rapporteur has drawn criticism from pro-Israel officials and groups in both the United States and the Middle East, who accuse her of “anti-Semitism” and “anti-Israel bias.” Recently, the US mission to the UN called for her dismissal, arguing that her allegations of genocide and apartheid against Israel were “false and offensive.”
The sanctions against Francesca Albanese come amid international pressure and polarization over the legitimacy of international investigations into the war in Gaza and accountability for possible crimes committed during the conflict.
