Georgetown University has confirmed that it is no longer affiliated with Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur for “Palestinian rights”, whom the US sanctioned earlier this year for antisemitism.
“Francesca Albanese is no longer affiliated with Georgetown University,” Anna Maria Mayda, director of the Institute for the Study of International Migration, told JNS on Friday.
“US institutions are prohibited by federal law from affiliating with individuals subject to US sanctions,” she added.
Albanese, who served as an affiliated scholar at Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service, was not a university employee but had access to academic resources and collaboration opportunities.
UN Watch, the Geneva-based NGO that monitors the United Nations, said earlier in the week that Georgetown University had removed Albanese from its list of affiliated scholars.
In July, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that “Albanese has spewed unabashed antisemitism, expressed support for terrorism and open contempt for the United States, Israel and the West.” That same month, the US Treasury Department listed her as a specially designated national, barring Americans and US organizations from maintaining any financial or institutional connection to her.
Albanese acknowledged her situation earlier this month, saying, “I had an affiliation with a US university. I used to lecture there. Everything has been cut down.”
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”, but her anti-Israel bias has continued to be exposed since.
Her criticism of Israel has grown since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack in Israel. The attack, in which Hamas terrorists killed over 1,200 people and took 250 hostages, was described by Albanese as an act that must be viewed in “context” and as a response to Israeli “aggression.”
She has also in recent months accused Israel of genocide, likened the Government of Israel to the “Third Reich,” and compared Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler.