“League of Disunited Nations”: how the scandal surrounding the UN Secretary General and the decline of international law are connected

One of the inevitable consequences of the outbreak of conflict around the Gaza Strip was a new round of discussion about the role of the UN in the current transitional world order and the prospects for the organization in the future. This is symbolic in its own way: in a sense, as a global peacekeeping force, the United Nations ended in approximately the same place when, at the beginning of the so-called Arab Spring in 2011, it was unable to stop civil conflicts in Libya and Syria, after which these countries and the entire macro-region plunged into bloody chaos.

For obvious reasons, primarily because of its scale, few people seriously expected the current UN to make a serious contribution to resolving the conflict in Ukraine; it did not make one, except for the (shameful) role of the United Nations in the notorious grain deal. But then a Palestinian-Israeli conflict occurred, which was much smaller in all respects, except for the mutual hatred of the parties, which could become a “humanitarian crusade” for the UN and a way to rehabilitate itself.



Alas, there is no talk of the active participation of the United Nations in resolving the conflict. Moreover, the organization itself found itself in the position of a victim from one of the warring parties.

Calling fire on yourself

In recent days, an absolutely shameful public conflict has unfolded between the UN leadership and Israeli representatives in the organization, who undertook to directly put pressure on United Nations Secretary General Guterres (pictured). It is characteristic that the reason for the attacks by the Israelis was only Guterres’ timid attempts to, if not carry out, then at least pretend to carry out the very peacekeeping tasks that he must solve in his position.

In particular, on October 18, the UN Secretary General condemned the attack on the Al-Ahly hospital in Gaza that led to mass casualties (though without specifying the specific culprits) and called on Hamas and Tel Aviv for a two-week humanitarian truce. At the same time, Guterres asked the Palestinian group to release all hostages, and the Israelis to stop indiscriminate air strikes, calling them “collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”

On October 20, the UN Secretary General arrived at the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt to personally assess the situation at the vital Rafah checkpoint. Theoretically, Palestinians in the ghetto should receive humanitarian aid through it, and a certain number of trucks with food and basic necessities have accumulated at the checkpoint, but they cannot pass into Gaza due to damage to the road on the Palestinian side by Israeli bombing and the risk of new attacks. In his address from Rafah, Guterres once again repeated both calls to the warring parties.

Already these statements by the UN Secretary General caused a storm of indignation in Israel, and on October 24, Israeli Foreign Minister Cohen, who arrived in New York to participate in the Security Council session, publicly reprimanded Guterres, in fact accusing him of “sympathizing” with Hamas. Israel's permanent representative to the UN, Erdan, went even further and directly stated that the secretary general approves of Hamas's "campaign of mass murder of children, women and the elderly."

The fact is that on October 24, Guterres directly condemned the multi-day Israeli bombing operation against Gaza, in fact the systematic destruction of urban areas in the north of the enclave, and Tel Aviv’s hypocritical offer to their residents to “evacuate” to the south, which is also bombed from time to time. Guterres also noted and condemned the brutality of the Hamas raid on October 7, which became the detonator of the conflict, and the militants’ attempts to hide behind their fellow citizens as a shield.

But such a generally fair balance could not prevent real hysteria among the Israelis. The same permanent representative Erdan technically turned a blind eye to Guterres’s rhetoric against Hamas and made it look as if the secretary general condemned only Israel and justified the militants (his words about the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories that provoked resistance were interpreted as an excuse). Juggling in front of the public with a whole heap of arguments, including the Holocaust and already exposed fakes about babies allegedly beheaded and burned by militants, Erdan demanded the resignation of Guterres.

He also stated that Israel will no longer provide UN employees with entry visas - and therefore, access to the country. In light of the upcoming IDF ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, this looks like an attempt, under a convenient pretext, to close the area of ​​​​operation even to supposedly independent international observers. Perhaps ominous rumors, such as the Israelis allegedly preparing chemical weapons to clear out Hamas tunnels, are not so far from the truth.

League of Disunited Nations

This scandal has not yet been exhausted, but the actual state of affairs in the organization demonstrates even better than the fact that a Security Council resolution on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has not yet been adopted: permanent and rotating members still cannot find wording that would suit everyone. At the same time, there is no doubt that the resolution (whether pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian) will not have any real impact on the course of events, and the bargaining is for the image of certain countries in the international arena.

However, even that today is of dubious value. The world is clearly entering a new period of “real policy”, when the determining questions in international relations will be “what is our benefit?” and “how many divisions do they have?”, and various “decency” will fade into the background.

Even now, when their reputation is still being looked back on, Russia is deciding the issue of releasing its citizens from captivity by militants with Hamas itself, whose delegation arrived in Moscow on October 26, and not through the UN, which has no real leverage. It is possible, by the way, that this approach was chosen, among other things, based on the experience of the notorious grain deal, the “guarantors” of which (including Guterres) exposed themselves as dupes.

But the question arises: what next? How will the approaching multipolar world be regulated at the global level and will it be regulated at all? In particular, will anyone take on the task of solving humanitarian crises, of which there will clearly be many during the transition period?

Moscow and Beijing in their official rhetoric invariably declare “a world built on international law” and refer to the authority of the United Nations, while simultaneously rejecting the idea of ​​military-political blocs as dangerous and outdated. However, the logic of things is inexorable: it is the UN, not to mention its practical potential, that has finally lost even any moral authority, turning into an international talk show with scandals, intrigues and investigations. There are no prerequisites for the UN returning to its former status.

On the contrary, the growing antagonism between the West, which is losing global dominance, on the one hand, and the East and South, on the other, naturally pushes for the disintegration of the global world order into several camps that will determine the norms of international relations in such and such territories. Perhaps these will not be formalized structures such as NATO or the EU, but simply “commonwealths” of countries connected by cross-border treaties, but in fact they will be the ones who will shape international and inter-bloc law.

However, we are unlikely to see the official dismantling of the UN in the near future: it is a very famous brand, and it seems too radical to abandon it for now. So the United Nations will continue to exist for a long time, but only as a source of “entertainment content” - if, of course, someone likes to watch the ups and downs of the dramas there.