United Nations UN Gaza investigator Francesca Albanese says US sanctions against her a sign of ‘guilt’
United Nations’ special rapporteur for Palestinian territories stresses all eyes must remain on Gaza as she urges ‘let’s stand tall, together’
Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza, has responded to news that she will be sanctioned by the Trump administration with a post on X saying “the powerful punishing those who speak for the powerless, it is not a sign of strength, but of guilt”.
On Wednesday, as part of its effort to punish critics of Israel’s 21-month war in Gaza, the state department sanctioned Albanese, an independent official tasked with investigating human rights abuses in the Palestinian territories.
On Wednesday the US secretary of state said on social media: “Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated.
“We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defence,” Marco Rubio wrote.
He announced Albanese would be added to the US sanctions list for work that had prompted what he described as illegitimate prosecutions of Israelis at the ICC.
Albanese has been the target of criticism from pro-Israel officials and groups in the US and in the Middle East. Last week, the US mission to the UN issued a scathing statement calling for her removal for “a years-long pattern of virulent antisemitism and unrelenting anti-Israel bias”.
The statement said Albanese’s allegations of Israel committing genocide or apartheid were “false and offensive”.
The US sanctions are the culmination of an extraordinary and sprawling campaign of nearly six months by the Trump administration to quell criticism of Israel’s handling of the deadly war in Gaza. Earlier this year, the Trump administration began arresting and deporting faculty and students of American universities who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations and other political activities.
