Francesca Albanese's fall: The 'but' that sparked the scandal

It is often said that the most important thing in a sentence is what comes after the "but." Precisely, a huge controversy broke out recently after the words of the United Nations special rapporteur, Francesca Albanese, who from the stage of the Rebuild Justice event in Rome reluctantly condemned the attack by a hundred demonstrators on the editorial office of the La Stampa newspaper in Turin...."But," she added, "at the same time, let this also serve as a warning to the press to go back to doing its job, to put the facts back at the center of its work and, if they can afford it, even a minimum of analysis and contextualization."

The assault on 'La Stampa': Violence and its apologist

On November 28, 2025, approximately one hundred pro-Palestinian activists violently stormed the offices of the La Stampa newspaper in Turin. The masked attackers went about smashing everything with alarming anger, accusing journalists of being "terrorists" and calling for the release of Imam Mohamed Shahin, who has an expulsion order and who preached that the October 7 pogrom was an "act of resistance." The vandalization included covering the entrance with excrement. Authorities arrested some 30 people, many of them linked to the Askatasuna social center and student collectives.

Albanese, during the Rebuild Justice conference, said that she understood the anger of the attackers and that the assault should be "a warning to the press to get back to work." Her words constituted a justification for the violence, insinuating that the victims deserved it for their news coverage. This stance provoked an unprecedented cross-cutting rejection.

The reaction of politicians, from Brothers of Italy to the Democratic Party, to Albanese's statements was immediate. The Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, also spoke out on the issue, emphasizing that "violence cannot be justified". The Minister for Parliamentary Relations, Luca Ciriani, said that it is inconceivable to assume that whoever suffers a violent incident somehow deserves it. For Paolo Trancassini, deputy of the Italian League (FdI), transforming an episode of violence against a newspaper's editorial office into an opportunity to launch warnings at the Italian press is a distortion of reality that cannot be ignored. The League called the statements "disturbing." Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani called the words "unacceptable," asking, "But what warning? Isn't the press free to write? Freedom of the press is a foundation of democracy."

Even figures on the left categorically distanced themselves. European Parliament Vice President Pina Picierno, of the Democratic Party, said violence is never a warning, and should simply be condemned without ifs and buts or excuses. Senator Filippo Sensi, also of the PD, declared, "Francesca Albanese's words about the fascist attack on the editorial office of La Stampa horrify me." Azione leader Carlo Calenda went further: Albanese "is another of those figures, like Ilaria Salis, of whom the left must at some point be ashamed." The secretary of the National Federation of the Italian Press, Alessandra Costante, called the statements "dangerous and painful."

"The image of Albanese marching alongside Greta Thunberg in Rome perfectly describes her moral and professional degradation."

A few weeks earlier, on October 29, 2025, during the UN General Assembly session in New York, Italy's permanent representative, Maurizio Massari, intervened in the presentation of Albanese's report. Although Italy is the rapporteur's country of origin, her government did not hesitate to publicly disavow her: "The report presented today by Special Rapporteur Albanese is entirely void of credibility and impartiality. As Italy, we are not surprised. The content of the report blatantly exceeds the specific mandate of the Special Rapporteur, which does not include investigations into alleged genocides or the broader international implications of the conflict. [...] There is ample evidence online and in her interviews that, as Special Rapporteur, Ms. Albanese cannot be considered impartial".

The day after the attack on La Stampa a demonstration took place, to which Albanese marched alongside Greta Thunberg and other jihadist activist figures. This march culminated with participants burning a photograph of Defense Minister Guido Crosetto and shouting slogans such as "Meloni resign" and expressing solidarity with Imam Shahin. The context is telling. Italy is the only Western country where a national union openly called for a pro-Palestinian general strike. This is not a minor fact, given that La Stampa was one of the media outlets that most supported the demonization of Israel, and propagated the narrative coming from terrorist bodies such as the Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry. Most of the world's media outlets echoed, throughout two years of war, what Hamas was spreading; however, this media, even with its biased reporting, did not satisfy radical activists, who demanded even more extreme propaganda.

The scandal also unleashed a stampede of Italian municipalities to disassociate themselves from the person they had made a heroine just months earlier. Cities such as Bologna, Turin, Naples, Florence and Cuneo, which had decided to grant her honorary citizenship, now openly expressed their regret. In Bologna, councilors of the Democratic Party publicly apologized for having voted in favor of the recognition. In Turin, the Democratic Party itself withdrew its initial support for the motion after it reached the leadership conference. In Naples, the formal resolution was stalled after her unfortunate statements stereotyping southern Italy. This massive retraction is not accidental: it reflects the belated realization that Albanese does not represent the democratic and humanitarian values that these municipalities believed they were defending, but an agenda incompatible with the principles of the rule of law.

UNRWA and the origins of fanaticism

To understand Albanese's trajectory, it is necessary to go back to her professional origins. Between 2010 and 2012, she worked as a legal officer for UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees that was later shown to have close ties to Hamas operations. This formative experience molded a biased view that she never tried to disguise. Her bigotry manifested itself early in alarming ways.

Examples abound, during the war in Gaza she has scattered all sorts of anti-Semitic libels and justified terrorism a thousand times over. But this goes back a long way, in 2015, after the terrorist attack on Charlie Hebdo journalists, Albanese blamed the CIA and Mossad for the Paris attack. When she applied for the position of UN special rapporteur in November 2021, her application repeated almost verbatim the rhetoric of South Africa's Department of International Relations. Her integration into the anti-Israel political-legal ecosystem was consolidated over the years, transforming anti-Israel activism into an institutionally backed legal warfare architecture.

Much has been made of Albanese's marriage to Massimiliano Cali, a senior economist at World Bank in Tunis, who appears to be much more extreme than his wife and has been at the center of a scandal over his alleged conflicts of interest, which violate the neutrality required in his institutional role funded in part by the U.S. In 2011, Cali worked as an economic advisor to the Palestinian Authority (PNA) Ministry of National Economy in Ramallah, under contract to the UN's UNDP, where he produced a report on the "economic costs of the Israeli occupation," a link Albanese omitted from her application for the UN post, generating accusations of lack of impartiality by the European Parliament. His extreme pro-Palestinian positions include justifying suicide bombings as "resistance". According to UN Watch allegations, he has glorified anti-Semitism, violating the World Bank's code of conduct.

U.S. sanctions

Recently, Secretary of State Marco Rubio imposed personal sanctions on Albanese, citing her "illegitimate and shameful efforts" to push for ICC action against U.S. and Israeli officials and companies. The sanctions freeze her U.S. assets, prevent her from entering the country and prohibit U.S. citizens and entities from providing her with goods or services. Rubio declared Albanese unfit to serve as rapporteur because she "has expressed blatant anti-Semitism, support for terrorism and open contempt for the United States, Israel and the West."

This step was historic. Albanese was also condemned by France, Germany and Canada for her anti-Semitic comments. But despite these active sanctions, Albanese was welcomed to South Africa in October 2025 as a dignitary. What should have been a cause for diplomatic embarrassment became a deliberate act of political defiance against the West, orchestrated by the South African government, a fact that reflected the institutional vacuum that characterizes Albanese's entire professional performance: the appearance of formal legitimacy without real democratic substance.

The elephant in the room

The image of Albanese marching alongside Greta Thunberg in Rome perfectly describes her moral and professional degradation. The notorious climate activist, now instrumentalized to legitimize terrorist causes, joined the degraded Albanese in calling for the resignation of the Italian democratic government and expressing solidarity with an imam who indoctrinates people in favor of terrorism.

The controversy surrounding Albanese has put on the back burner a fundamental question that her defenders systematically avoid: is Albanese's fanaticism an individual aberration or does it reflect a systemic problem with the institution? It would be comforting to regard Albanese as a bad apple but if we examine the track record of the past few decades, we discover that Albanese's method is the same one systematically adopted by the United Nations to deal with Middle East problems. The UN facilitated Albanese's performance despite clear evidence of anti-Semitism, conspiracy theories, and veiled support for terrorism. Her appointment was not an accident but the predictable result of an institutional culture that has normalized double standards against Israel.

Be that as it may, Albanese, like Thunberg, are already damaged goods when it comes to pro-global jihad and pro-Palestinianism marketing. They have turned their careers into a criminal circus, and those who until recently sought their closeness now flee from them as if they were stinkers. The underlying question is why Albanese remains a UN special rapporteur and whether her insertion in the institution is a product of UN negligence in choosing a profile like hers for Middle East issues or, on the contrary, reflects a specific approach required for political humanitarianism practitioners with respect to this region. Finally the "but" that Albanese used to justify the violence is the one that today highlights her downfall. The Albanese scandal exposes, also, the moral decadence of a body that learned to live with that "but" as if it were acceptable.