UN Lawfare Regime Put on Notice for Vile Attacks on Israel

Israel faces unrelenting lawfare from every corner of the U.N. I saw it firsthand last month in Geneva, as Israel came under fire for defending itself against a nuclear-armed Iran. The usual suspects in the international community launched vicious attacks and unleashed new lawfare against our ally. The ACLJ responded to the latest absurd legal attack, as the Trump Administration has taken direct legal action against some of the worst anti-Israel perpetrators of lawfare.

The U.S. is sanctioning Francesca Albanese, U.N. Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory.

Secretary Marco Rubio stated that Albanese has “spewed unabashed antisemitism, expressed support for terrorism, and open contempt for the United States, Israel, and the West.” Secretary Rubio is spot-on. Albanese and her colleagues at the U.N. are doing just that.

We just finished responding to a report that was recently submitted by Albanese’s colleagues, three U.N. Commissioners spewing similar hatred and lies at the so-called Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel (Commission or COI).

The three Commissioners, Navanethem Pillay, Miloon Kothari, and Chris Sidoti, made seriously flawed, false allegations against Israel. We responded to several of their reports, pointing out legal and factual errors.

In its most recent report, the Commission falsely accused Israel of “intentionally targeting” educational facilities and religious and cultural sites in the Gaza Strip without any military purpose.

Under the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC), civilian facilities, such as schools, hospitals, and religious sites, are protected and may not be targeted. However, if such a facility is used for military purposes, it becomes a legitimate military target, subject to the rule of proportionality to avoid harm to civilians.

Hamas often purposely uses civilian facilities to carry out its terrorist activities, i.e., storage of weaponry, to run operations, and carry out attacks against Israel from therein. These unlawful actions convert the protected facilities into legitimate military targets. Thus, the Commission simply disregarded both the law and the facts.

We conducted a detailed analysis of the Commission’s entire report and sent our response to the U.N. Secretary-General and dozens of Member States at the U.N. Security Council and the Human Rights Council.

Our response noted that the Commission’s report “provides no evidence, legal analysis, or any criteria for its methodology to support its accusations and conclusions.”

We noted that a careful analysis of the Commission’s report reveals the following:

The Commission simply rejects official Israeli statements, such as Israel Defense Forces (IDF) information of Hamas military activity at targeted sites, without providing any evidence to the contrary or reasons for its rejection. It applies a double standard by questioning Israeli evidence while taking Hamas at its word when Hamas denies using a facility for military purposes. Further, in some cases, the Commission relies on vague language, unverified assumptions, or irrelevant indicators like soldiers’ behavior to suggest bad intent or illegality of Israeli actions.

Each example in which the Commission accused Israel of intentionally targeting a protected facility was simply based on one statement: The Commission“was unable to independently verify Israeli security forces’ claim” that the facility was being used by Hamas. This is despite Israel providing evidence, in the form of videos and pictures, of Hamas’ activity on the targeted site.

In some instances, the Commission concluded that Israel “likely” destroyed a site just because Israeli forces were in the vicinity. Such conclusions were not only irresponsible but also legally flawed.

Based on these flawed assumptions and baseless conclusions, the Commission accused Israel of committing war crimes.

Our response noted that the Commission’s latest report “shows its neglectful pattern of repeating one-sided allegations against Israel while disregarding the overwhelming, publicly available evidence of Hamas’ unlawful conduct.”

We further noted:

This pattern of selective and false reporting seriously undermines the Commission’s credibility and points to a larger effort driven by political bias rather than objective inquiry. For justice to be upheld, the international community must dismiss reports based on speculation and prioritize objective, evidence-based reviews in line with international legal standards.

By sanctioning Francesca Albanese, the Trump Administration is on the right track. We recommend that the U.S. also sanction the so-called “Independent Commission of Inquiry” and its Commissioners who are contributing to the lies and false allegations against Israel.