The United Nations' dogged pursuit of a Palestinian state, despite the ongoing aftermath of the brutal October 7th Hamas massacre and kidnappings of Israelis, has left no doubt about the anti-Israel sentiments of the world body. 

More evidence is seen in the efforts of UN officials, both past and present, who work against Israel behind the scenes. One recent case involves an attempt to disrupt the support and friendship offered by evangelical organizations to the state of Israel.

Eugene Kontorovich from the Heritage Foundation specializes in constitutional and international law, particularly when it comes to anti-Israel moves at the United Nations. He spoke with CBN News Middle East Bureau Chief Chris Mitchell about one unique effort to push back against the anti-Israel agenda.

MITCHELL: Eugene Kontorovich, thanks for joining us. You're a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation. You're involved in a lawsuit that's really unique. Tell us about it.

KONTOROVICH: Francesca Albanese is a woman who worked for the United Nations. She had a position as one of the United Nations kind of professional Israel bashers, the special rapporteur for Palestine. And she has been essentially a Hamas supporter, justifying Hamas' attacks and making vicious blood libels against the Jewish state. But now she's gone further and she started defaming American companies and American NGOs, American organizations, accusing them of genocide for merely being involved with the state of Israel. Now that's legally baseless, but it's also defamatory.

Our clients are two Christian charities who have a faith-based mission of helping the Jewish people in the Holy Land. For that work, she accused them of being accessories to genocide, threatened them with a whole bunch of scary consequences, including criminal prosecutions. And that is defamation. And for that, you can be sued in the United States. And we are helping them, in fact, sue her.

Now, she is not actually a United Nations official anymore because she was reappointed to her position in a manner that has been deemed improper. And the United States, this is the most amazing part, sanctioned her a few weeks ago for working with the International Criminal Court against Israel. So she has been sanctioned by the United States. Her property is frozen in the United States. She can't travel to the United States. But at the same time, our clients want justice and want restitution for the harm they've suffered from her.

MITCHELL: What is the message that she's done to these two organizations, what message does that send? 

KONTOROVICH: What she is trying to do, she understands that Christian support for the Jewish state is a fundamental part of the strength that it has. But she also sees it as the weak link. Companies that do business within Israel, they're doing it for profit. She thinks these Christian charities, they're not making money off it. If I scare them, that will break this crucial connection between Christian people and the state of Israel. Now, she's wrong. These groups are not running away, but they have suffered real harm. And for that, they want to hold her to account. And for the lies that she has said about them, they want to hold her to account.

***Please sign up for CBN Newsletters to ensure you receive the latest alerts from a distinctly Christian perspective.***

MITCHELL: How do you see this going forward now? 

KONTOROVICH: So she is almost certainly going to say, as a UN official, 'I have immunity.' So that's part of the problem with the United Nations. They think they can do anything they want because they claim to have even more immunity from lawsuits than the president of the United States. But in fact, she isn't a UN official anymore. And that clearly is the view of the U.S. State Department, which has imposed sanctions on her. So we're going to fight against her immunity argument. And hopefully we're going to show that you can't simply attack American organizations from behind the authority of the United Nations if you don't really have it.

MITCHELL: Is this one example of what may be a growing trend of trying to disrupt this relationship between evangelical organizations and the state of Israel?

KONTOROVICH: Yeah, absolutely. And you see it in different places and from different sides. But she also shows that she understands the importance of the relationship. Because some of the other targets that she has attacked are major corporations, Caterpillar, Airbnb. 

And these are small Christian charities. Why did she pick such small groups? Because she understands the spiritual importance of this. And that's what she's coming to destroy. They're fighting back.

MITCHELL: Are there other groups doing the same thing or thinking of the same thing? 

KONTOROVICH: She only named two Christian groups. Both of them are suing. But, of course, we would be delighted if some of the other companies that were named would also join.

MITCHELL: Final thoughts. What's at stake here? 

KONTOROVICH: Part of the problem with the United Nations is there's no accountability for them. And in her case, she's not even part of the United Nations, but she's trying to use it as a shield. We need to begin showing that you cannot simply hoist the blue flag and commit any kind of violation you want. That's the message here.