Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar addressed the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations 51st Leadership Mission to Israel on Monday morning, urging Israel to act offensively against those who delegitimize it.
Responding to Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Sa'ar stressed: "We must delegitimize the antisemites who are delegitimizing the Jewish state."
Last week, Albanese said that "humanity now has a common enemy," referring to the State of Israel.
"Over the past weekend, at least five European foreign ministers sharply criticized Albanese and called on her to resign," Sa'ar said. "She is antisemitic."
"Immediately, from the Palestinian Authority to Hamas, and also within the core of the antisemitic left-people rushed to defend her. Their motives are clear.
"I believe we must be on the offensive, not on the defensive. We must delegitimize those who delegitimize us."
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.
In December 2023, Albanese called a demand that Hamas release the 251 hostages it kidnapped on October 7, including small children and 9-month-old Kfir Bibas, "unacceptable." She has never called for the release of the hostages who were kept in Gaza. She has, however, called for the release of a Gaza hospital director who was arrested on suspicion of being a Hamas leader.
Shortly after the October 7th massacre, Albanese published a book titled 'J'Accuse,' co-opting the title of a famous essay calling out the antisemitism of the infamous Dreyfus trial for a work in which she attempted to shift the blame for the massacre from the Hamas perpetrators to Israel.
Albanese has also denied that Israel has the right to self-defense against Hamas even after October 7.