'Israel has always killed children': Albanese's claim echoes history of blood libels - opinion

One word in Francesca Albanese's remarks exposes her entire argument. “Israel has always killed children,” the United Nations special rapporteur told a committee of the Irish Parliament.Before the Israeli soldier was born, before the government was formed, and before the shot she was supposedly discussing was fired, she had already reached her verdict. That single word, “always,” reveals Albanese's antisemitic audacity and perhaps raises questions about her state of mind.There was no need to identify a place, a time, an act, or a person responsible. She asked her listeners to accept the outrageous claim that killing children is a permanent characteristic of the Jewish state. Anyone who speaks this way has already abandoned the question of what actually happened. She knew the answer the moment she heard the accused's identity.At the same time, Albanese claimed that Palestinian detainees had been raped using dogs trained in Europe and that people in Europe were profiting from selling them. In the remarks attributed to her, she offered no evidence that dogs had been trained or traded for that reason. It was clearly an absurd story that she may not even believe herself.What is infuriating is that once those words left the committee room, Israel was somehow expected to disprove this nonsense.