Bipartisan congressional letter calls for UN official’s dismissal over ‘outrageous’ antisemitic remarks.
In a letter addressed to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, 11 Democratic and Republican members of Congress called for the firing of the UN’s special rapporteur on Palestine, Francesca Albanese, due to her “outrageous” antisemitic statements, reports the algemeiner.
“Ms Albanese’s comments are only the latest in a pattern of antisemitic behaviour and rhetoric at the UN, which is obsessively focused on the world’s only Jewish state,” the letter reads, starting with the “Enough is enough” exclamation.
The letter cites Albanese’s comments and writings over the past 10 years, including a 2014 letter in which she claimed America was “subjugated by the Jewish lobby” and her 2022 remarks to a Hamas conference in Gaza where she told the terrorist group’s attendees that they “have a right to resist this occupation.”
Albanese has repeatedly asserted a Palestinian “right to resist,” including during the latest round of indiscriminate rocket fire from Gaza in August. “An unlawful act of resistance does not make the resistance unlawful,” she said.
Albanese has refused to apologise for her remarks and says that her statement about the US being subjugated by Jews was “wrongly mischaracterised as antisemitic.”
Citing Secretary General Guterres’ claim that “there is no room for antisemitism in the UN,” the letter concludes with a call for Albanese’s ouster.
“Failure to take meaningful action on repeated instances of antisemitism by UN officials undermines the UN’s credibility,” it reads. “We urge you to demonstrate that the UN is capable of genuinely addressing antisemitism by removing Ms. Albanese from her post.”
Albanese’s formal title is “Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967,” and she was appointed to a six-year term in May 2022.
More News
