UN official with history of controversial anti-Israel comments to speak at Princeton
One critic wrote: ‘She has a history of making antisemitic remarks and supporting terrorism. This event is being subsidized on the taxpayer dime. Disgusting.’
Albanese has faced opposition before for controversial comments, including stating that Israel, not Hamas, is the ‘real threat.’
A controversial UN official who has made many comments that were widely condemned as anti-Semitic will speak at Princeton University later this fall.
Francesca Albanese, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on the Palestinian Territories, will speak at Princeton on Oct. 29 as part of the Dean’s Leadership Series.
Albanese’s planned appearance has already drawn some criticism, with incoming Massachusetts Institute of Technology student Eyal Yakoby writing on X: “She has a history of making antisemitic remarks and supporting terrorism. This event is being subsidized on the taxpayer dime. Disgusting.”
Breaking: Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur, is scheduled to speak at Princeton University as part of the Dean’s Leadership Series. She has a history of making antisemitic remarks and supporting terrorism.
This event is being subsidized on the taxpayer dime. Disgusting. pic.twitter.com/ADflIGD2DA— Eyal Yakoby (@EYakoby) September 22, 2024
Albanese has been outspoken about her anti-Israel opinions, especially regarding the Jewish state’s counteroffensive against the terror group, Hamas. “These past year [sic] in Gaza has marked the beginning of the end of an era,” Albanese posted to X on Saturday. “While Palestinians are being genocided and Gaza destroyed, Israel is expanding its humanitarian camouflage doctrine to the region.”
“In front of us, the abyss. No one will really be safe anymore,” she continued. “Until and unless this madness is forcefully stopped.”
Albanese provoked controversy during a Feb. 12 event at the Harvard Kennedy School in which she blamed Israel for the Oct. 7 massacre and accused it of “apartheid.”
“I understand why Israel is using this argument of anti-Semitism because by saying ‘we were attacked because we are Jews,’ it’s feeding the existential threat that many Jews feel. But the point is that the real threat is the apartheid that Israel imposes on the Palestinians,” she said.
A few days before the event, she claimed that anti-Semitism had nothing to do with Hamas’s massacre of Jews on Oct. 7, writing: “The victims of [Oct. 7] were not killed because of their Judaism, but in reaction to Israel’s oppression.”
Albanese also faced pushback after she was invited to speak at Brown University at a Sept. 16 event. Thousands of Brown students, faculty, staff, and others sent an open letter to the administration calling on it to withdraw Albanese’s invitation.
The Brown letter blamed Albanese for “blatant antisemitism and legitimization of terrorism” and said she “promotes dangerous tropes and terrorism against our communities.”
Campus Reform has contacted Princeton University for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
