Several members of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee joined a chorus of global legislators and organizations in calling for the United Nations to reject the renewal of an antisemitic U.N. official’s term.
Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), who chairs the committee, and committee members Reps. Young Kim (R-Calif.), Michael Lawler (R-N.Y.), Keith Self (R-Texas), Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.), Cory Mills (R-Fla.) and Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.) sent a letter to U.N. Human Rights Council President Jürg Lauber, of Switzerland, demanding he turn down the reappointment of Francesca Albanese, U.N. special rapporteur for Palestinian rights, to a second three-year term, for failing to uphold the council’s code of conduct and repeated incendiary comments about Israel.
Albanese “has consistently aligned herself with Hamas terrorists, accused Israel of genocide, likened the government of Israel to the ‘Third Reich,’ and compared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler,” the legislators wrote to Lauber. “The council has allowed antisemitism and anti-Americanism to thrive within, with a seeming unwillingness to hold the most egregious violators of human rights to account.”
The missive notes that Albanese’s mandate includes an obligation to act impartially but claims that Albanese “unapologetically uses her position as a U.N. special rapporteur to purvey and attempt to legitimize antisemitic tropes while serving as a Hamas apologist” by blaming Israel for the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
It also points out that Albanese’s comments have at various times been condemned as antisemitic by the governments of the United States, France, Germany and Canada.
“Regrettably, Ms. Albanese’s rhetoric has perverted the very institution and its foundational principles in which she was appointed to serve,” the House members wrote, urging Lauber to reject Albanese’s reappointment, which is scheduled to take place this week by a decision of the 47-member Human Rights Council.
The Dutch government, dozens of French lawmakers and several Jewish organizations have also called for the rejection of the renewal of Albanese’s mandate.
