The Spanish government awarded the UN legal expert Francesca Albanese one of its highest civilian honours in recognition of what it termed her “extensive work in documenting and denouncing violations of international law in Gaza”.

Albanese, an Italian human rights lawyer who serves as the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, has been vocal in her criticisms of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, which she has described as genocide.

She has also called out the international community over its failure to prevent and punish acts of torture, genocide and other serious human rights violations.

Albanese has faced the prospect of arrest in Germany over her use of language and has been hit with sanctions by the US government for urging the international criminal court (ICC) to investigate American and Israeli companies and individuals over their alleged complicity in gross human rights violations.

In a ceremony in Madrid on Thursday, Pedro Sánchez, Spain’s prime minister, awarded Albanese the Order of Civil Merit. Sánchez is one of the most vociferous European critics of Israel’s conduct in Gaza.

“Public responsibility also brings with it a moral obligation not to look the other way,” he said. “It is an honour to bestow the Order of Civil Merit on a voice that upholds the conscience of the world.”

Sánchez has also written to the EU to ask it to block the US sanctions against Albanese, arguing they “represent a very worrying precedent that compromises the independent workings of institutions that are essential to international justice”.

A day earlier, Albanese had visited the Reina Sofía museum in Madrid to see Picasso’s Guernica. Standing in front of the Spanish artist’s fierce condemnation of the Nazi bombing of the Basque town in 1937, she said the destruction it reflected was “reminiscent of what we have seen” in Gaza.

She also said the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip was meaningless, adding: “Those in power are pushing for the world to take its eye off Gaza and for it to be forgotten about. And that’s what most of the world has done.”

The lawyer, who is promoting her book, When the World Sleeps: Stories, Words and Wounds of Palestine, renewed her criticism of Israel and the lack of international action to protect Palestinians at another event in the Spanish capital on Wednesday evening.

In an echo of the controversial slogan “From the river to the sea”, Albanese said: “There is a genocide against the entire Palestinian people from the river to the sea: the aim is destruction and the result is also destruction.”

She praised the Spanish government for its stance on Gaza and its attempts to help fight the US sanctions. The rapporteur also warned that Israel’s actions had set a dangerous precedent when it came to eroding international law.

“The moment we’re in is an apocalypse,” she said in remarks reported by elDiario.es. “A lot of people have woken up but it’s not enough. In March 2024, I said that if we didn’t stop Israel, there would be a change in the rules of war. And then six months later, that was happening in Lebanon and it’s now happening in Iran, and they call it the Gaza doctrine.”