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Marco Rubio Fights Lawfare with Sanctions — and Wins

Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, attends a side event during the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Denis Balibouse

A UN official is getting her due for persecuting Israel and the United States using a bogus international court system — and she won’t be the last.

On July 9, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio imposed sanctions on UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese. Albanese has used her platform at the United Nations to relentlessly attack Israel and wage economic warfare against US companies.

The sanctions sent reverberations through other UN bodies that have been weaponizing international law to fuel illegitimate investigations focusing on the United States and Israel.

Days after the State Department’s announcement, all three commissioners of the UN’s Commission of Inquiry — another UN mechanism established for attacking Israel at Turtle Bay — resigned their posts.  

The Trump administration has sanctioned officials of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the past in response to attacks on the United States and Israel. However, this is the first time that Washington has acted not just against the overreaching court itself, but against those, such as Albanese, that directly engage in the ICC’s efforts to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute nationals of the United States or Israel.

On July 3, Albanese submitted a report to the UN that called on member states to boycott and sanction the Jewish State. The special rapporteur also urged UN member states and the ICC to investigate and prosecute corporations and their executives — including those of American companies — who have done business with Israel.

The ICC was established in 2002 with the lofty goal of prosecuting individuals for the most serious crimes of concern to the international community. The court was supposed to intervene only when countries were unwilling or unable to genuinely investigate or prosecute such crimes themselves, and the US government has long argued that the ICC has jurisdiction only over countries that are party to the Rome Statute.

When the court was established, both the US and Israel — two democracies that have robust judicial systems and internal review processes — declined to join the court, fearing it would become yet another venue for lawfare – i.e. the weaponization of law to pursue a political agenda.

Unfortunately, the American and Israeli fears were justified; the ICC has become one of the world’s premier venues for lawfare against both the US and Israel.

President Donald Trump’s efforts to combat the ICC began during his first term. In 2020, the court’s then-chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, opened an investigation that put the US military and the entire defense establishment at risk of arrest when traveling abroad. They could then be imprisoned until trial at The Hague.

Washington opposed the investigation, arguing that not only did the court lack jurisdiction, but the court was superfluous, as the United States was capable of handling such investigations. The Trump administration attempted to block the investigation, publishing an executive order that threatened visa bans and sanctions on ICC officials, employees, and agents, as well as their immediate family members.

Despite the explicit warning from Washington, Bensouda pursued the investigation. And in September 2020, Washington sanctioned the chief prosecutor and one member of her staff, freezing their assets in the United States and listing them as “specially designated nationals,” a title usually reserved for terrorists and international drug traffickers.

The Biden administration foolishly reversed Trump’s order, arguing that engagement is the best way to make progress with those that wish to harm the United States and our allies.

Likely emboldened by the Biden administration’s decision, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in the last months of Biden’s term.

Trump remedied the Biden administration’s wrong-footed policy in February, publishing Executive Order 14203, designating the ICC’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan. Three months later the State Department added sanctions on four ICC judges.

The Executive Order broadened the administration’s authorities to tackle the ICC, authorizing sanctions on those directly engaged with the international court. Albanese would have been wise to heed the administration’s warning and think twice before producing the report that urged the prosecution of more than a dozen US companies and their executives.

 A July 18 preliminary injunction issued by a US district court judge in Maine has been characterized as blocking enforcement of the order. However, the injunction only bars the government from enforcing the executive order against two US citizens, and only in response to their “provision of speech-based services to the ICC.” All of the foreign persons sanctioned under the order thus far – Karim Khan, four ICC judges, and Francesca Albanese — remain sanctioned. 

The lawfare industry is robust and presents dozens of additional targets for sanctions under Trump’s executive order. Going forward, the Trump administration should sanction the Belgium-based Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF). The group exists to pursue legal action, in both international and national courts, against individuals they deem responsible for alleged Israeli war crimes against Palestinians. The HRF is endangering more than 1,000 IDF soldiers by urging they be arrested if they leave Israel so that they can be tried for war crimes. By directly engaging with the ICC in efforts to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute Israelis , the Hind Rajab Foundation is clearly deserving of legal consequences, just as special rapporteur Albanese is.

Enia Krivine is the senior director of the Israel Program and the National Security Network at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Follow her on X @EKrivine.

The post Marco Rubio Fights Lawfare with Sanctions — and Wins first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War

Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.

Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.

“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”

GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’

Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.

“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.

“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.

“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.

After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”

RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL

Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”

Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.

“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”

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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests

A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco

Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.

People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.

“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”

Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.

On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.

Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.

On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.

“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.

Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.

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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan

Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas

Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.

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