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The Trump administration said on Wednesday that it was issuing sanctions against an independent official who has been tasked with investigating human rights abuses in the Palestinian territory. 

The development comes as the latest effort by the US to punish critics of Israel's 21-month war in Gaza. 

The decision to sanction Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza, comes after the US recently pressured the UN to remove her from the post, but was unsuccessful, according to the Associated Press.

Albanses, a human rights lawyer, has been vocal about Israel's "genocide" against Palestinians in Gaza. Both Israel and the US have denied Albanese's accusations. 

In recent weeks, the UN official sent letters to various countries urging them to pressure Israel, including through sanctions, to end its deadly bombardment of the Gaza Strip. The Italian national has also strongly backed the International Criminal Court’s indictment of Israeli officials, including the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for war crimes. 

Most recently, she issued a report naming several US giants among companies aiding what she described as Israel's occupation and war on Gaza. 

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the sanctions in a post on social media. “Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” he said.  “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defence.”

Albanese has been a target of the pro-Israel officials and groups in the US and the Middle East. Last week, the US mission to the UN called for her removal in a scathing statement for "a years-long pattern of virulent anti-Semitism and unrelenting anti-Israel bias”.

It dismissed Albanese's allegations of Israel committing genocide or apartheid as "false and offensive." 

The sanction on Albanese is a part of a broader campaign by the Trump administration for nearly six months to quell criticism of Israel's handling of the deadly war in Gaza, which is closing in on two years. Earlier, the Trump administration arrested and deported faculty and students from American universities who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations and other political activities. 

Israel's military offensive against Hamas in Gaza has killed more than 57,000 Palestinians, with women and children making up most of the casualties, according to Gaza’s health ministry.