US issues sanctions against UN investigator probing abuses in Gaza
[July 10, 2025]
By FARNOUSH AMIRI
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The Trump administration announced Wednesday that
it is issuing sanctions against an independent investigator tasked with
probing human rights abuses in the Palestinian territories, the latest
effort by the United States to punish critics of Israel's 21-month war
in Gaza.
The State Department's decision to impose sanctions on Francesca
Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza,
follows an unsuccessful U.S. pressure campaign to force the
international body to remove her from her post. It also comes as Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is visiting Washington this week to
meet with President Donald Trump and other officials about the war in
Gaza and more.
It’s unclear what the practical impact the sanctions will have and
whether the independent investigator will be able to travel to the U.S.
with diplomatic paperwork.
Albanese, an Italian human rights lawyer, has been vocal about what she
has described as the “genocide” by Israel against Palestinians in Gaza.
Both Israel and the U.S., which provides military support to its close
ally, have strongly denied that accusation.
The U.S. had not previously addressed concerns with Albanese head-on
because it has not participated in either of the two Human Rights
Council sessions this year, including the summer session that ended
Tuesday. This is because the Trump administration withdrew the U.S.
earlier this year.
Albanese has urged countries to pressure Israel
In recent weeks, Albanese has issued a series of letters urging other
countries to pressure Israel, including through sanctions, to end its
deadly bombardment of the Gaza Strip.
She has also been a strong supporter of the International Criminal
Court's arrest warrants against Israeli officials, including Netanyahu,
for allegations of war crimes. She most recently issued a report naming
several large U.S. companies as among those aiding what she described as
Israel’s occupation and war on Gaza.
“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the
United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” Secretary of
State Marco Rubio posted on social media. “We will always stand by our
partners in their right to self-defense.”
Liz Evenson, international justice director at Human Rights Watch, said
the U.S. government's decision to sanction Albanese for seeking justice
through the ICC “is actually all about silencing a U.N. expert for doing
her job — speaking truth about Israeli violations against Palestinians
and calling on governments and corporations not to be complicit.”
“The United States is working to dismantle the norms and institutions on
which survivors of grave abuses rely,” Evenson said in a statement.
“U.N. and ICC member countries should strongly resist the U.S.
government’s shameless efforts to block justice for the world’s worst
crimes and condemn the outrageous sanctions on Albanese.”
Albanese's July 1 report focuses on Western defense companies that have
provided weapons used by Israel’s military, as well as manufacturers of
earth-moving equipment that have bulldozed Palestinian homes and
property.
It cites activities by companies in the shipping, real estate,
technology, banking and finance and online travel industries, as well as
academia.
“While life in Gaza is being obliterated and the West Bank is under
escalating assault, this report shows why Israel’s genocide continues:
because it is lucrative for many,” her report said.
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Francesca Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human
rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, talks to
the media during a press conference at the European headquarters of
the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, July 11, 2023. (Salvatore
Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP, File)
A request for comment from the U.N.’s top human rights body was not
immediately returned.
Israel strongly refutes Albanese's allegations
Israel’s diplomatic mission in Geneva, where the 47-member Human
Rights Council is based, called Albanese’s report “legally
groundless, defamatory, and a flagrant abuse of her office” and
having “whitewashed Hamas atrocities.”
Outside experts, such as Albanese, do not represent the United
Nations and have no formal authority. However, they report to the
council as a means of monitoring countries’ human rights records.
Albanese has faced criticism from pro-Israel officials and groups in
the U.S. and in the Middle East. The U.S. mission to the U.N. issued
a scathing statement last week, calling for her removal for “a
years-long pattern of virulent anti-Semitism and unrelenting
anti-Israel bias.”
The statement said Albanese's allegations of Israel committing
genocide or apartheid are “false and offensive.”
Israel's ambassador to the U.N., Danny Danon, celebrated the U.S.
action, saying in a statement Wednesday that Albanese’s “relentless
and biased campaign against Israel and the United States has long
crossed the line from human rights advocacy into political warfare.”
Trump administration's campaign to quiet criticism of Israel
It is a culmination of a nearly six-month campaign by the Trump
administration to quell criticism of Israel's handling of the war in
Gaza. Earlier this year, the administration began arresting and
trying to deport faculty and students of U.S. universities who
participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations and other political
activities.
The war between Israel and Hamas began Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas-led
militants stormed into Israel and killed some 1,200 people, mostly
civilians, and took 251 people captive. Israel’s retaliatory
campaign has killed over 57,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s
Health Ministry, which says women and children make up most of the
dead but does not specify how many were fighters or civilians.
Nearly 21 months into the conflict that displaced the vast majority
of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, it is nearly impossible for the
critically wounded to get the care they need, doctors and aid
workers say.
“We must stop this genocide, whose short-term goal is completing the
ethnic cleansing of Palestine, while also profiteering from the
killing machine devised to perform it,” Albanese said in a recent
post on X. “No one is safe until everyone is safe.”
___
Associated Press writer Jamey Keaten in Geneva contributed to this
report.
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