Sanctioning the truth

UN rapporteur for Palestine Francesca Albanese retorted to the US decision to sanction her by stating on X that “the powerful [are] punishing those who speak for the powerless; it is not a sign of strength, but of guilt.” This amounts to the call of “kill the messenger” adopted by influential actors who refuse to intervene to prevent cruelty and injustice.

“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted on social media. “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defence.”

Independent Italian human rights lawyer Albanese has been in the crosshairs of the US and Israel since she took up the five-year post in May 2022. This intensified this year after her mandate was renewed for another five years. She has referred to Israel’s 21-month deadly and devastating military campaign on Gaza as “genocide” and accused the US of complicity by providing Israel with arms and political cover. In September 2004, she told Modern Times Review, the lack of curbs on Israel displays “the ineffectiveness of international law and of the multilateral system. It’s not just that Israel is not listening to me or my reports only. Israel is not listening to the Inter-national Court of Justice, the Security Council, which ordered a ceasefire, or the Human Rights Council, which requested an arms embargo.” She warned that “Israel and the United States are bringing the clock back 100 years...with very few states doing what they can to stop it [consequently we are heading toward] a lawless world.”

“The imposition of sanctions on special rapporteurs is a dangerous [and] “is unacceptable,” UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric declared. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has been urged to take action against US sanctions in the UN General Assembly or the International Court of Justice.

Unpaid Albanese has been chosen along with a dozen other experts by the 47-member Human Rights Council based in Geneva to monitor and report on human rights in Afghanistan, Belarus, Burundi, Cambodia, North Korea, Eritrea, Myanmar and Russia as well as handed a mandate to investigate the occupied Palestinian territories. While special rapporteurs have no formal authority and do not represent the UN, they can inform the International Criminal Court and other institution of rights violations.    

The imposition of sanctions came in response to her June 30 report submitted to the Council in which she listed more than 30 companies of involvement in “the transformation of Israel’s economy of occupation [into] an economy of genocide.” The report divides countries complicit in the genocide into specific categories such as arms manufacturers, tech firms, construction companies, service firms, banks, pension funds, insurers, universities, and charities. These include Lockheed Martin, Microsoft, Amazon, Palantir, IBM and Danish shipping giant Maersk. Their combined involvement has enabled Israel to wage war on Gaza and repress Palestinians in the West Bank, she wrote. Her report called on national judicial systems and the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate and charge companies and senior executives. UN member states were urged to sanction and block assets of convicted offenders.

Rights council president Jurg Lauber regretted the imposition of sanctions and urged UN member states “to fully cooperate with the special rapporteurs [and] refrain from any acts of intimidation or reprisal against them.”

Former European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell wrote on X that for the first time in the world organisation’s history, the US has imposed sanctions on a UN mandate holder and argued that Washington’s sanctions constitute a “flagrant violation of [the UN’s] Charter.” He said, “The EU is bound by its history and treaties to defend [International] Law and must ensure the protection of UN mandate holders.”

Amnesty International’s secretary general Agnes Callamard responded to US sanctions by saying, “This is a shameless and transparent attack on the fundamental principles of inter-national justice, Special Rapporteurs are not appointed to please governments or to be popular but to deliver their mandate.” Callamard said, Albanese’s mandate “is to advocate for human rights and international law. [This is} essential at a time when the very survival of Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip is at stake.” Callamard accused the Trump administration of continuing an “assault on international law ...to protect the Israeli government from accountability at all costs.”

Irish Labour Party Member of the European Parliament for Dublin Aodhan O Riordan has added his name to those nominating her for the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of her work “to highlight the destruction of Gaza by Israel.” He castigated the Trump administration for sanctioning her. He was joined by Canadian legislators and more than 300,000 people who signed a petition calling for her nomination.

The first woman to be appointed to her post. Albanese, 48, is well qualified to carry out her mandate. She received a law degree from the University of Pisa in Italy and a Master of Laws from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London. She worked for a decade as an expert on rights and migration for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees. She also advised the UN, global governments, and civil society groups dealing with rights issues in the Middle East and Southeast Asia as well as EU missions in Haiti, Guinea Bissau, and Pakistan. She consulted with US non-profit Project Concern, International on protection issues during the 2014 Ebola emergency in West Africa.  She is an affiliate of the Issam Fares Institute of the American University of Beirut.

To protect Israel from being held accountable, the US has sanctioned ICC prosecutor Karim Khan and four ICC judges. The sanctions ban them from entering the US, block assets they hold in the US, and prohibits and penalises anyone, including US citizens, for providing “funds, goods or services” to the sanctioned individuals. The latter measure is meant to deprive Albanese of sources in the conduct of her investigations.

Since Israel’s founding in 1948, US presidents have largely ignored the warnings of predecessors. In his 1796 farewell address the first US President George Washington warned the country to avoid permanent alliances with foreign countries and rely instead on temporary alliances for emergencies. He stated, “The nation which indulges toward another habitual hatred or an habitual fondness is in some degree a slave.”

Photo: AFP