nuclear-news

Francesca Albanese: “The World Is Not Sleeping—It Is Looking Away”

 Francesca Albanese – by Mr. Fish

July 8, 2026, SCHEERPOST, Joshua Scheer

United Nations Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese shares stories of the immense suffering in Palestine and laments the gutting of international law in her new book, “When the World Sleeps”.

As the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza continues and international institutions face mounting questions over their ability—or willingness—to enforce international law, few voices have attracted as much global attention as Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories. Praised by supporters for her uncompromising investigations and criticized by her opponents with equal intensity, Albanese has become one of the most prominent legal figures documenting allegations of apartheid, occupation, and genocide. In a wide-ranging conversation with Chris Hedges about her new book, When the World Sleeps, Albanese discusses the human stories behind her reporting, the treatment of Palestinian civilians and medical workers, the pressures she says have been brought against her personally, and why she believes the crisis in Gaza represents not only a regional tragedy but a profound test of the international legal order itself.

Throughout the conversation, Albanese also discusses the personal consequences of her work, from financial sanctions and frozen assets to the challenges of publishing her book in the United States. At the heart of the discussion is a question she believes the international community can no longer avoid: whether governments, institutions, and ordinary citizens will continue to remain passive in the face of mounting evidence of suffering—or act before, as her book’s title suggests, the world once again sleeps through another historic injustice.

You should read the full transcript below [on original]—and, even more importantly, the book itself—but one passage that particularly stood out was Albanese’s reflection on where power truly resides, what governments ultimately respond to, and the remarkably small number of people who control an extraordinary share of the world’s wealth. As we move toward what many fear could become an increasingly dystopian future, she argues this is not, as some dismissively claim, a conspiracy theory. It is a reality unfolding in real time.

Francesca Albanese said

“Yeah, I think those who have read the book, and then I’d like also to say a few words about how difficult it’s been to have this book made available to the US readership, because there has been such pressure from pro-Israel support groups against it. You guess why. Yeah, for me, Palestine has been a revealer. It’s not that all of a sudden, we woke up in a world that is dominated by the US, especially the world we are part of politically, militarily, strategically, the US is the dominant character here. And Israel is a sort of extension of it in the Middle East. It’s an extension of Western power and Western supremacy. I know that the Israelis do not like it, but I do also believe that they do not realize how instrumentalized they are because of interests that are above all of us. We tend to think in terms of states as the ultimate decision makers. We think of it in democracies. We think of it in dictatorships. But, in fact, I don’t think that states are the decision makers. States today, more than before, more than a few decades ago, respond to certain interests, economic, military and financial interests that are connected to the main power holders in this world. I mean, and there are numbers. What I’m saying may sound like conspiracy theories to people who might not know enough about the inequality of the world.

The Thomas Piketty Institute in its most recent inequality report mentions this data, which I found shocking, staggering, the fact that half of the world population retains altogether one third of the wealth which is retained by 50,000 people in the world. I repeat, 50,000 people in the world retain three times the wealth retained by half of the world population. How is it possible? Who are these? Clearly, they are not just individuals like you and I. They retain pockets of power. And it’s those connected to the extractive industry for the control of natural resources, those connected to securing the use of force, military power and surveillance, and those connected to financial transactions, corporations and banks and pension funds. So, these are the main powers with certain corporations like pharmaceuticals more influential than others, or those related to tourism for example. However, this is the brain power of those 50,000 people.”

Transcript ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… https://scheerpost.com/2026/07/08/francesca-albanese-the-world-is-not-sleeping-it-is-looking-away/

July 12, 2026 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | media