Francesca Albanese’s visit to South Africa to deliver the 23rd Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture in Johannesburg last week drew a legal sideshow after a sheriff attempted to serve papers on her at the Sandton Convention Centre.

Albanese is an Italian international lawyer and academic who since May 2022 has served as the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on the situation in Gaza and the West Bank.

Attention around her South Africa trip has focused new attention on her chequered public record.

The Anti-Defamation League, a think tank based in Washington in the United States (US), has compiled a dossier titled: Francesca Albanese in her own words. This alleges that she: “has long coopted antisemitic tropes and legitimized support of terrorism in her critiques of Israel, using her platform to spread intense anti-Israel rhetoric.”

It continues: “She is the first Special Rapporteur to be condemned by both Germany and France for antisemitism and was condemned by then US Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism Deborah Lipstadt, then US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield, and then US Ambassador to the UN Human Rights Council, Michèle Taylor.”

The same ADL compilation reproduces antisemitic and inflammatory statements, including Albanese likening Israel’s actions to the: “Third Reich,” calling Gaza: “a concentration camp of the 21st century,” and posting an image comparing Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler with the line: “This is precisely what I was thinking today.”

It also quotes her response to President Emmanuel Macron’s description of 7 October as the largest antisemitic massacre of the century, to which Albanese replied: “The victims of 7/10 were not killed because of their Judaism but in response to Israel’s oppression.”

Beyond South Africa, her tenure has drawn escalating global rebukes. In July 2025, the United States announced sanctions against Albanese, a move she said would disrupt her life, yet vowed to continue her work.

South Africa’s government and the Nelson Mandela Foundation have both taken strong lines against Israel, whilst maintaining direct ties with Iran and accusing the Jewish state of being essentially a criminal state responsible for the genocide of Palestinians.