UN Special Rapporteur says Israel’s Gaza genocide fuelled by Western support

The United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories says Israel’s genocide in Gaza was not committed in isolation, but is part of an “international system of complicity”. 

A new report, “Gaza Genocide: a collective crime”, by Francesca Albanese examines the role of 63 states in Israel’s actions in both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, condemning the atrocities, which, she found, have been facilitated through “diplomatic, military, economic and ideological support” to Israel. 

Read more: UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese calls for global solidarity against war crimes in Palestine

“The genocide in Gaza was not committed in isolation, but as part of a system of global complicity. Rather than ensuring that Israel respects the basic human rights and self-determination of the Palestinian people, powerful Third States – perpetuating colonial and racial-capitalist practices that should have long been consigned to history – have allowed violent practices to become an everyday reality,” reads the 24-page report. 

“Even as the genocidal violence became visible, States, mostly Western ones, have provided, and continue to provide, Israel with military, diplomatic, economic and ideological support, even as it weaponised famine and humanitarian aid. The horrors of the past two years are not an aberration, but the culmination of a long history of complicity.” 

Albanese presented her new report to the UN General Assembly Third Committee on Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Issues on Tuesday, 28 October, speaking to delegates remotely from the Desmond and Leah Tutu Foundation in Cape Town. 

Albanese was in South Africa to deliver the 23rd annual Nelson Mandela Lecture in Johannesburg on 25 October. 

The report came as Israel began fresh strikes on Gaza City, threatening the precarious US-brokered ceasefire agreement reached earlier this month.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered his defence forces on Tuesday to immediately carry out “powerful strikes” in Gaza, after accusing Hamas of firing on its Israeli troops and failing to return hostages’ bodies, the Associated Press reported.  

Hamas denied involvement in the attack on Israeli forces, accusing Israel of violating the ceasefire agreement. 

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The attacks on Tuesday marked the most significant flare-up in violence since the ceasefire came into effect on 10 October. According to a report by Al Jazeera, 18 Palestinians were killed in the air strikes on Tuesday.

At a press conference on Tuesday afternoon, Albanese said “there is no ceasefire in Gaza”. 

“People keep on dying or being starved and forcibly displaced – as simple as that.” 

Fuelling Israel’s war machine 

In her report, Albanese claims that the flow of weapons and ammunition by many Western States to Israel, “despite clear obligations and compounding concerns, indicate an intent to facilitate Israeli crimes”.

Albanese, an Italian legal scholar, has been the Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories since 2022. Special rapporteurs are independent human rights experts appointed to advise or report on specific situations.

“The International Court of Justice has spoken three times on the risk of genocide in January, March and May 2024,” said Albanese, referring to the provisional measures issued in South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the World Court. 

“This has triggered the obligation to prevent acts of genocide, to punish incitement and stop genocide and to punish acts of genocide. And instead, states continue to obscure, ignore and even profit from Israel’s violations of international law,” she said. 

Albanese said that military cooperation with Israel “is probably the most significant of the forms of complicity, because through arms trade and intelligence sharing, some states more than others, have fuelled Israel’s war machine”.

According to her report, the US, Germany and Italy – her own country – are among Israel’s largest suppliers of arms. 

“US political, diplomatic, military and strategic support to Israel has escalated after 7 October 2023,” the report read. 

“Since October 2023, the US has transferred 742 consignments of ‘arms and ammunition’... and approved tens of billions in new sales. The Biden and Trump Administrations reduced transparency, accelerated transfers through repeated emergency approvals, facilitated Israeli access to US weapons stockpiles held abroad and authorised hundreds of sales just below the amount requiring congressional approval,” it continued. 

The US and Germany have provided 90% of Israel’s arms imports, according to Albanese. “But at least 26 states, with Italy – my own country, first – being listed for having supplied or facilitated arms component transfer to Israel, while many others keep on buying weapons that have been tested on the Palestinians,” she said. 

US sanctions against Albanese

In July, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that he was imposing sanctions on Albanese. She became a “specially designated national”, a status generally reserved for arms smugglers and terrorists. 

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People on that list cannot travel to America, they lose access to any assets they may have in that country, cannot do business with US companies and cannot use US currency, according to a report from the New York Times. 

The attacks on Ms Albanese are not just an attack upon an individual, but upon the United Nations system itself. They represent fundamental violations of the Convention on Privileges and Immunity, and also on the host country agreement with the United States. They are simply unacceptable.

Albanese has said that the sanctions imposed on her by the Trump administration will have serious impacts on her life and work. On Tuesday, she addressed reporters at the UN from Cape Town, due to the US sanctions against her. 

“I’m honoured and humbled to be in South Africa,” Albanese said.

“Although, I deeply regret not being able, as a UN Special Rapporteur protected under the UN Charter and under the UN Convention on Privileges and Immunities, to present my report in person in New York in the UN Headquarters due to the unlawful sanctions that are being imposed on me simply for fulfilling my UN mandate,” she said. 

Albanese continued: “I’ve been the first UN expert, but again, UN persona, to receive sanctions by any state – all the more, in my case – by one of the most powerful states in [the] international community, which as I said today to member states is an affront to the United Nations itself; its principles; its soul… I am surprised that, since July, no concrete steps other than declarations and condemnations – which frankly I appreciate very much, but do not resolve the problem – [have been taken].” 

She said the US sanctions imposed on her have been “utterly impairing”.

Albanese’s comments at her press conference came after she presented her report to the UN General Assembly on Tuesday morning, and followed a heated exchange with the Israeli ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon. 

In his speech to the committee, Danon stated: “Ms Albanese, you are a witch, and this report is another page in your spellbook. You have tried to curse Israel with lies and hatred but your poison has failed. Every page of this report is an empty spell. Every accusation, a charm that does not work because you are a failed witch.”

The chair of the committee, Cherdchai Chaivaivid, issued a strong rebuke of Danon, reprimanding the ambassador for his remarks: “I request the distinguished representative of Israel to avoid derogatory and inflammatory remarks which are personal in nature. Personal attacks against mandate holders or other experts should not be tolerated.” 

At a separate press conference later on Tuesday, Australian human rights expert Chris Sidoti, who was on the UN Independent Commission of Inquiry (CoI) which recently found that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, condemned the attacks on Albanese. 

Sidoti was briefing the media, alongside South African judge and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, on their recent CoI findings. 

“Ms Albanese has been subjected to attacks that no UN official should be subjected to and, indeed, attacks that have been unparalleled in the past. We saw that again today at the Third Committee, when the Israeli ambassador launched an absolutely outrageous attack on Ms Albanese. He called her a witch and the implication was obvious: she should be burned at the stake,” Sidoti said. 

“The attacks on Ms Albanese continue,” he added, noting that the comments from Danon were continued by the Italian ambassador to the UN. 

“The attack on her has been accentuated by the United States in imposing sanctions on her. Those sanctions are unlawful under international law and they are unlawful under United States domestic law.

“The attacks on Ms Albanese are not just an attack upon an individual, but upon the United Nations system itself. They represent fundamental violations of the Convention on Privileges and Immunity, and also on the host country agreement with the United States. They are simply unacceptable.” DM

Victoria O’Regan is a 2025 Dag Hammarskjöld Journalism Fellow whose reporting on the 80th UN General Assembly and its activities in New York has been sponsored by the Dag Hammarskjöld Fund for Journalists.