Francesca Albanese will make a difference

Francesca Albanese, the Italian human rights lawyer and the UN Human Rights Council special rapporteur for Palestine, is the woman of the hour, someone people all over the world can look to for hope and courage. She has laid out a legal framework to show that not just the government of Israel is guilty of acts of genocide and human rights violations in occupied Palestinian territories (oPt), but also all other entities including corporations, non-profit and for-profit organizations are culpable and liable.

And she has outlined the evolution of international law in the matter. She has shown passion, courage and lawyerly meticulousness in arguing her point. She writes in her report, entitled “From Economy of Occupation to Economy of Genocide”. She states her general theoretical thesis, her basic argument: “The role of corporate entities in sustaining Israel’s illegal occupation and ongoing genocidal campaign in Gaza is the subject of this investigation, which focuses on how corporate interests underpin Israeli settler-colonial the twofold logic of displacement and replacement aimed at dispossessing and erasing Palestinians from their land.”

The reason that the United States and Israel are exploding with anger at Albanese is due to the fact that she hits at the most vulnerable point of Israel, and its arch-ally, the United States: the corporate world. The economic power and the military superiority of Israel and the US is hugely dependent on the support, especially material and financial, that the corporates lend to their governments. That is why, the US has issued sanctions against Albanese.

Israel and US would have been livid with anger with Albanese even if she had confined her criticism to the governments of Israel and the US. But she has targeted the Achilles heel of the two countries: the economic and commercial heft of their corporations, without which Israel would not be able to carry its expansionist policy in the West Bank, and its relentless violence against the civilians in Gaza since October 2023.

The initial justification of Israel for unleashing violence against Gaza is due to the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel. Albanese is making a broader point. It goes beyond the government, and it points an accusing finger at the big corporations.

She reminds the corporates that they cannot escape liability if they support a government and its policies which are gross violations of international law, which involve practice of apartheid, genocide. She reminds the corporates that they cannot pretend that they did not know what was happening. If their business activities help in any way a government in violating human rights. She cites the precedents: “The post-Holocaust Industrialists’ Trial laid the complex groundwork for recognizing the international criminal responsibility of corporate executives for participation in international crimes.

By addressing corporate complicity in apartheid, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission helped shape corporate responsibility for human rights violations. Increasing domestic and international litigation signal a growing trend toward corporate accountability.” These are strong precedents in international law.

The world has been helplessly witnessing the killing of civilians in Gaza in their thousands over the last two years. The substantial protests came first from South Africa which had moved the International Criminal Court (ICC) against Israel’s military action in Gaza resulting in death of civilians. Albanese has expanded the scope of the liability of violence against unarmed people from governments to corporations and other entities.

This is a politically and economically sensitive issue though it does not directly concern political actors. Albanese displays the passion of an activist against human rights violations, but as a lawyer she is careful to chart the narrow path of how corporations are culpable in political conflict.