Angry claims of 'double standards' in international law roil the UN

"We are edging towards the unimaginable," United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told assembled world leaders on Monday. "A powder keg that risks engulfing the world."

"We can't go on like this," he added, describing "a world of impunity where violations and abuses threaten the very foundation of international law and [the] UN Charter" — the core UN principle that it is illegal for nations to acquire territory through force, and that other nations must act to prevent them.

If one phrase encapsulates the fissures that opened up earlier this week as the world's nations met for their annual UN General Assembly, it was "double standards."

"We rebel against the double standards on human rights," said Chile's President Gabriel Boric.

"Human rights cannot be judged according to which dictator or president happens to be violating them, whether it happens to be [Benjamin] Netanyahu in Israel or [Nicolás] Maduro in Venezuela, whether it's [Daniel] Ortega in Nicaragua or [Vladimir] Putin in Russia."

The world owes the same debt to "the teenage girl murdered in Gaza," he said, as to "the Ukrainian child kidnapped into Russia, the dissident silenced in Nicaragua, or the woman expelled from school in Afghanistan just for being a woman."

The eruption of war in Lebanon in the wake of Israel's pager-bomb attacks and the escalation of cross-border hostilities by Hezbollah and Israel raised tensions in what was already certain to be a fraught UN session.

"The speed and scale of the killing and destruction in Gaza are unlike anything in my years as secretary general," said Guterres. "More than two hundred of our own staff have been killed, many with their families.

"The people of Lebanon, the people of Israel and the people of the world cannot afford for Lebanon to become another Gaza."

Moments after meeting with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, King Abdullah of Jordan called out countries that remained mute as Israeli forces killed UN staff and ignored UN court rulings.

"This Israeli government has killed more children, more journalists, more aid workers and more medical personnel than any other war in recent memory," he said.

"Humanitarian workers who proudly wear the emblem of this institution are disparaged and targeted, and the rulings of the UN's International Court of Justice are defied, its opinions disregarded.

"So it's no surprise that both inside and outside this hall, trust in the UN's cornerstone principles and ideals is crumbling."

The new conflict in the Middle East only intensifies the pressure felt by western governments, and particularly the United States, which has often used its Security Council veto over the past year to shield Israel and block ceasefire resolutions.