Israel blasts UN official over Netanyahu-Hitler comment

Israel condemns a UN official for making a comparison between Netanyahu and Hitler, deeming it highly inappropriate.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, has been accused of “anti-Semitism” by Israel for supporting a social media post that compared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler.

Albanese replied to a post on X (previously known as Twitter) last Thursday that featured an image of Hitler being cheered by a throng of people, juxtaposed with Netanyahu’s reception in the US Congress earlier this week.

Craig Mokhiber, a former UN human rights official, wrote in the post that history is constantly observing. Late last October, Mokhiber resigned and accused the world organization of neglecting its duty to prevent what he termed as the “genocide” of Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

On Thursday, Albanese replied by saying “This is exactly what I had in mind today.”

On Wednesday, Netanyahu spoke to Congress in Washington and justified Israel’s actions during the Gaza conflict. The Health Ministry of Palestine states that over 39,000 Palestinians lost their lives during this war.

In October of last year, Israel initiated a military operation in response to an unexpected assault by the Palestinian militant group Hamas on the Jewish state. The attack resulted in roughly 1,100 casualties and 250 hostages taken.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry promptly reacted to the online debate, condemning Albanese on X as irredeemable and alleging that she employed the UN as cover for disseminating anti-Semitic views.

Israel’s UN Mission in Geneva criticized Albanese by stating that “the system is fundamentally corrupt” because of a current UN “expert” supporting the Holocaust distortion spread by the former director of the UN Rights Office.

Albanese has been accused by Israel’s newly appointed ambassador to Geneva, Daniel Meron, of misusing her UN position for the dissemination of “hateful and incendiary language.”

Israel has strongly criticized Albanese in previous instances, such as earlier this year when she submitted a report suggesting that Israel had breached the threshold of committing “genocide” against Palestinians in Gaza. Following its release and subsequent rejection by Israel, Albanese reported receiving threatening messages.

Axios reports that nearly half of House and Senate Democrats skipped Netanyahu’s Wednesday address, including former Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi criticized the speech as the worst in Congress’ history due to the Israeli leader’s failure to make any progress towards a ceasefire or hostage deal with Hamas.