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World Leaders to Meet at UN amid Threat of Gaza, Ukraine War Spillovers

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly at United Nations Headquarters in New York, New York, USA, 22 September 2023. (EPA)
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly at United Nations Headquarters in New York, New York, USA, 22 September 2023. (EPA)
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World Leaders to Meet at UN amid Threat of Gaza, Ukraine War Spillovers

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly at United Nations Headquarters in New York, New York, USA, 22 September 2023. (EPA)
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly at United Nations Headquarters in New York, New York, USA, 22 September 2023. (EPA)

More than 130 world leaders will meet at the United Nations next week, faced with wars in the Middle East and Europe threatening to spread, frustration at the slow pace of efforts to end those conflicts, and worsening climate and humanitarian crises.
While the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group in the Gaza Strip and Russia's war in Ukraine are set to dominate the annual high-level UN General Assembly, diplomats and analysts say they don't expect progress toward peace.
"The wars in Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan are going to be the three main crisis-points in focus at the General Assembly. I don't think we are likely to see breakthroughs on any of them," said Richard Gowan, UN director at the International Crisis Group.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres last week told Reuters that the wars in Gaza and Ukraine were "stuck with no peaceful solutions in sight."
Concerns about a spillover of the Gaza conflict to the broader Middle East have again escalated after Lebanese militant group Hezbollah accused Israel of detonating pagers and hand-held radios in two days of deadly attacks. Israel has not commented on the accusation.
"There is a serious risk of a dramatic escalation in Lebanon, and everything must be done to avoid that escalation," Guterres told reporters on Wednesday.
The war in besieged Gaza was triggered by a Hamas attack on civilians in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, two weeks after world leaders finished their annual gathering last year.
Mediation efforts by the United States, Egypt and Qatar have yet to broker a ceasefire and global patience has waned nine months after the UN General Assembly overwhelmingly demanded a humanitarian truce and as the Gaza death toll reaches 41,000.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu - who has long accused the UN of being anti-Israel - and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas are both scheduled to address the General Assembly on Sept. 26.
DIPLOMATIC SPEED-DATING
The annual gathering of world leaders to mark the beginning of each new session of the General Assembly is often referred to as diplomatic speed-dating.
While the event is anchored by six days of leaders' speeches to the assembly, much of the action happens on the sidelines with hundreds of bilateral meetings and dozens of side events seeking to focus the global spotlight on the main issues.
Also looming this year is the prospect of a new US administration. Republican Donald Trump - who cut UN funding and called the global body weak and incompetent while in office from 2017 to 2021 - faces Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in a Nov. 5 election.
"Clearly in the back of everyone's mind is going to be a guy called Donald Trump," Gowan said. "I think in a lot of the private conversations around the General Assembly ... the number one question will be what will Trump do to the organization."
This year side events will be held on the war and humanitarian crisis in Sudan, where famine has taken hold, international efforts to help Haiti fight gang violence and the Taliban crackdown on women's rights in Afghanistan.
Guterres on Wednesday poked fun at himself, saying he has "no power and no money."
"There are two things the Secretary-General of the United Nations has, and I have to say that I've been using them," he told reporters. "One is my voice, and nobody will be able to shut it up. And second is the capacity to convene people of goodwill to address and solve problems."
IRAN, UKRAINE
Western accusations about Iran's role in the Middle East - Hamas, Hezbollah and Yemen's Houthis are aligned with Tehran - and support for Russia's war in Ukraine also shadow this year's UN General Assembly.
European powers seek to revive efforts to rein in Iran's nuclear program and Iranian and European officials are due to meet in New York next week to test their mutual willingness to engage.
Iran's comparatively moderate new president Masoud Pezeshkian will address the United Nations on Tuesday.
Pezeshkian "will focus on detente, building confidence with the world, and de-escalation," a senior Iranian official said, but he will also "stress Iran's right to retaliate" against Israel if needed.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy will address the high-level General Assembly gathering for the third time since Russia invaded his country. He is due to address a meeting on Ukraine of the 15-member Security Council on Tuesday and the General Assembly on Wednesday.
Zelenskiy has a plan to push Russia to diplomatically end the war that he wants to present to US President Joe Biden this month. He also wants to share it with both of Biden's potential successors, Harris and Trump.
Some US officials have already been briefed on elements of the plan.
"We think it lays out a strategy and a plan that can work. And we need to see how we can promote that as we engage with all of the countries' heads of state who will be here in New York ... we do have hope to make some progress," US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield told reporters on Tuesday.
While Russian President Vladimir Putin virtually addressed the General Assembly in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, he has not physically traveled to New York for the event since 2015. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is instead due to speak to the General Assembly on Sept. 28.

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Biden Signs Bill That Averts Govt Shutdown Ending Days of Washington Upheaval

United States President Joe Biden participates in a holiday visit to patients and families at Children's National Hospital in Washington, DC, USA, 20 December 2024. (EPA)
United States President Joe Biden participates in a holiday visit to patients and families at Children's National Hospital in Washington, DC, USA, 20 December 2024. (EPA)
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Biden Signs Bill That Averts Govt Shutdown Ending Days of Washington Upheaval

United States President Joe Biden participates in a holiday visit to patients and families at Children's National Hospital in Washington, DC, USA, 20 December 2024. (EPA)
United States President Joe Biden participates in a holiday visit to patients and families at Children's National Hospital in Washington, DC, USA, 20 December 2024. (EPA)

President Joe Biden signed a bill into law Saturday that averts a government shutdown, bringing a final close to days of upheaval after Congress approved a temporary funding plan just past the deadline and refused President-elect Donald Trump’s core debt demands in the package.

The deal funds the government at current levels through March 14 and provides $100 billion in disaster aid and $10 billion in agricultural assistance to farmers.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., had insisted lawmakers would “meet our obligations” and not allow federal operations to close. But the outcome at the end of a tumultuous week was uncertain after Trump had insisted the deal include an increase in the government's borrowing limit. If not, he had said, then let the closures “start now.”

Johnson's revised plan was approved 366-34, and it was passed by the Senate by a 85-11 vote after midnight. By then, the White House said it had ceased shutdown preparations.

“There will be no government shutdown,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

Johnson, who had spoken to Trump after the House vote, said the compromise was "a good outcome for the country” and that the president-elect “was certainly happy about this outcome, as well.”

The final product was the third attempt from Johnson, the beleaguered speaker, to achieve one of the basic requirements of the federal government — keeping it open. The difficulties raised questions about whether Johnson will be able to keep his job, in the face of angry Republican colleagues, and work alongside Trump and his billionaire ally Elon Musk, who was calling the legislative plays from afar.

The House is scheduled to elect the next speaker on Jan. 3, 2025, when the new Congress convenes. Republicans will have an exceedingly narrow majority, 220-215, leaving Johnson little margin for error as he tries to win the speaker's gavel.

One House Republican, Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland, criticized Republicans for the deficit spending in the bill and said he was now “undecided” about the GOP leadership. Others are signaling unhappiness with Johnson as well.

Yet Trump's last-minute debt limit demand was almost an impossible ask, and Johnson had almost no choice but to work around that pressure. The speaker knew there wouldn’t be enough support within the slim Republican majority alone to pass any funding package because many Republican deficit hawks prefer to cut the federal government and would not allow more debt.

Instead, the Republicans, who will have full control of the White House, House and Senate in the new year, with big plans for tax cuts and other priorities, are showing they must routinely rely on Democrats for the votes needed to keep up with the routine operations of governing.

The federal debt stands at roughly $36 trillion, and the spike in inflation after the coronavirus pandemic has pushed up the government’s borrowing costs such that debt service next year will exceed spending on national security. The last time lawmakers raised the debt limit was June 2023. Rather than raise the limit by a dollar amount, lawmakers suspended the debt limit through Jan. 1, 2025.

There is no need to raise that limit right now because the Treasury Department can begin using what it calls “extraordinary measures” to ensure that America does not default on its debts. Some estimate these accounting maneuvers could push the default deadline to the summer of 2025. But that’s what Trump wanted to avoid because an increase would be needed while he was president.

GOP leaders said the debt ceiling would be debated as part of tax and border packages in the new year. Republicans made a so-called handshake agreement to raise the debt limit at that time while also cutting $2.5 trillion in spending over 10 years.

It was essentially the same deal that flopped Thursday night — minus Trump’s debt demand. But it's far smaller than the original deal Johnson struck with Democratic and Republican leaders — a 1,500-page bill that Trump and Musk rejected, forcing him to start over. It was stuffed with a long list of other bills — including much-derided pay raises for lawmakers — but also other measures with broad bipartisan support that now have a tougher path to becoming law.

Trump, who has not yet been sworn into office, is showing the power but also the limits of his sway with Congress, as he intervenes and orchestrates affairs from Mar-a-Lago alongside Musk, who is heading up the new Department of Government Efficiency.