UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, who has become notorious for her criticism of Israel, did so again on Saturday, accusing Israel of “genocide” after the IDF struck a Hamas command center which was embedded inside a mosque in the Al-Taba’een school compound.
At least 19 terrorists were killed in Saturday’s strike, and care was taken to ensure that as few civilians as possible were affected. However, reports in Gaza claimed that over 100 people, including many civilians, were killed in the strike.
Albanese condemned the attack in a post on social media site X, writing, Gaza: “In the largest and most shameful concentration camp of the 21st century, Israel is genociding the Palestinians one neighborhood at the time, one hospital at the time, one school at the time, one refugee camp at the time, one 'safe zone' at the time. With US and European weapons. And amid the indifference of all ‘civilized nations’.”
“May the Palestinians forgive us for our collective inability to protect them, honoring the most basic meaning of [international] law,” she added.
The IDF is continuing to investigate the reports of a higher number of casualties, to verify if there is truth to them.
However, the IDF noted that "Hamas has been caught a number of times lying regarding everything connected to IDF strikes and its own strikes."
"Every IDF strike carried out against terrorists is exaggerated by Hamas with no regard for reality. Hamas continues to lie to the world."
Albanese’s anti-Israel bias was first exposed in 2022, in the form of antisemitic posts she made on social media, in which she claimed that the “Jewish lobby” controls the US.
At the time, Albanese rejected arguments that the comments about the “Jewish lobby” were antisemitic and claimed they were “mischaracterized”.
In July of last year, Albanese accused Israel of transforming Palestinian Arab territories into an "open-air prison" through widespread detentions of Palestinian Arabs.
Since the Hamas massacre on October 7, she has condemned Israel for defending itself and gone as far as to claim that Israel has no right to defend itself.
Later, Albanese denied that the Hamas massacre in southern Israel on October 7 was antisemitic.
More recently, she endorsed a social media post comparing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry fired back, slamming her on X as being “beyond redemption.”
“It is inconceivable that (Albanese) is still allowed to use the UN as a shield to spread antisemitism,” it said.
Israel’s mission to the UN in Geneva wrote, “When a current UN ‘expert’ endorses Holocaust distortion spread by the former (UN rights office) director in New York... the system is rotten to its core. It’s high time to #UNseatAlbanese!“