The General Assembly speeches reveal a dual crisis in the international system. The first concerns the absence of justice, manifested most clearly in Palestine; the second relates to a shift in the international balance of power, evident in the wars in Iran and Ukraine. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned of violence, displacement, settlement expansion and the spectre of ethnic cleansing in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, citing the Palestinian question as a stark example of the crisis of legitimacy and the selective application of international law. He spoke explicitly of the need to comply with the International Court of Justice’s legally binding provisional measures in the genocide case brought against Israel by South Africa and other states. Guterres described the shift in the balance of power as an “irreversible” movement towards a multipolar world. That transition is evident not only in US efforts to preserve the manifestations of its hegemony amid the rise of China and Russia, but also in the growing independence of the positions adopted by countries of the Global South and Europe’s attempts to strengthen its role. The Gulf crisis reveals regional powers seeking greater space to shape their own security, while the war in Ukraine demonstrates the impossibility of any single power monopolising the shaping of international settlements.

The opening of the General Assembly session also constitutes an annual occasion on which world leaders set out their countries’ positions and priorities on international issues, creating a public and official record of states’ positions. In parallel, bilateral and multilateral meetings and summits are held separately between states within the framework of their relations. The Palestinian question and the wars in Iran and Ukraine remain at the forefront of the international issues addressed in countries’ statements during this session. Guterres opened the general debate, after which statements by national leaders began. Brazil was the first country to speak, followed by the United States. The first day also featured addresses by the leaders of Türkiye, Qatar, Jordan and France, alongside those of a number of other countries. Today, President Mahmoud Abbas is due to deliver a pre-recorded address, after the United States denied him a visa to enter the country to attend the meetings of the General Assembly’s regular session. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is also due to address the Assembly today.

READ: What is the extent of the UN’s impunity when it comes to the two-state politics?

The speeches addressing Palestine at the opening of the General Assembly’s General Debate appeared, despite the differing political and geographical positions of their speakers, to collectively construct an integrated argument: one that begins by diagnosing the crisis on the ground, proceeds to identify the nature of the institutional and legal failure to resolve it, and culminates in the question of the responsibility of the international community and its system to deliver justice.

Guterres established the legal framework for this approach when he stressed that peace means the “restraint of power by law” and recalled the “legally binding provisional measures” issued by the International Court of Justice, calling on all parties to “comply with international law and the Court’s orders”, while warning that “violence, displacement and settlement expansion” in the West Bank were “raising the spectre of ethnic cleansing”.

Guterres established the legal framework for this approach when he stressed that peace means the “restraint of power by law” and recalled the “legally binding provisional........

© Middle East Monitor