When the World Sleeps

“Incisive, heart-wrenching…an indispensable, at times deeply sickening, overview of the situation on the ground in Palestine.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Braving a tidal wave of calumny, Francesca Albanese has not only upheld international law during a nihilistic assault on it by leaders of the world’s democracies. She has also helped keep alive the idea of individual conscience during an extensive moral and intellectual breakdown among writers and journalists. With its bold and lucid truths about the rich and powerful, and profound compassion for their victims, When the World Sleeps reminds us, in a dark time, of a still achievable nobility of the life of the mind.” —Pankaj Mishra, author of The World After Gaza

“Francesca Albanese is an outstanding international civil servant, a passionate jurist, and a formidable champion of Palestinian rights. Her humanity shines through everything she writes, notably her reports to the UN. In this book she writes with characteristic generosity of spirit about the people who helped her open her eyes and act for Palestine. A remarkable book by a brilliant, energetic, and exceptionally courageous woman.” —Avi Shlaim, emeritus professor of International Relations at Oxford University and author of Genocide in Gaza: Israel’s Long War on Palestine.

“When the World Sleeps is a work of legal witnessing written from inside the collapse of the international order. Drawing on international law, lived encounters, interviews, and personal testimony, Francesca Albanese traces what it means to keep invoking law under conditions of emergency—even as legal institutions repeatedly fail to act. The book reflects a sustained engagement that refuses distance or safety, and a willingness to speak plainly within institutions structured to absorb and neutralize critique. Attentive to colonial relations without reducing the analysis solely to them, Albanese exposes the genocide in Gaza not as a failure of knowledge but of political will. In doing so, the book gives voice to what many already fearfully know: that international law can no longer rely on silent leadership, and must be upheld from the ground up or not at all. This is a necessary book to read, even for those who disagree with Albanese’s terms of engagement—perhaps especially so.” —Yael Berda, associate professor at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and author of Living Emergency: Israel’s Permit Regime in the Occupied West Bank

“The voice of Francesca Albanese is as uncompromising in its commitment to human justice, as relentless in its appeal to our common humanity, and as courageous in face of slander, disdain, and suppression, as once the voice of the prophets.” —Göran Rosenberg, author of Israel, a Personal History