WORLD POLITICS
War has always been brutal. That is precisely why generations before us tried to place limits on it.
The Geneva Conventions and the wider body of international humanitarian law were not created in the belief that war could be made humane. They emerged from a more modest and urgent principle: even in war, there must be boundaries. Civilians are not combatants. The wounded must be treated. Hospitals and humanitarian workers require protection. Prisoners cannot simply be tortured or executed. Military necessity does not provide an unlimited licence to destroy.
Today, those boundaries are under extraordinary pressure.
The International Committee of the Red Cross estimates that the world is living with around 130 armed conflicts, more than double the number fifteen years ago. Some have continued for decades. At the same time, warfare itself is changing. Drones, artificial intelligence, cyber operations and long-range precision weapons are extending battlefields far beyond traditional front lines. More than 204 million people live in areas under the full or contested control of armed groups, while homes, schools, hospitals, power networks and water systems continue to be damaged or destroyed in conflicts around the world.
The question confronting the international community in 2026 is therefore larger than whether individual countries are breaking particular rules. It is what happens if violations, expansive interpretations and exceptions become sufficiently common that the restraints themselves begin to lose their deterrent force.
The consequences would not remain in Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan or the next battlefield. They would eventually reach all of us.
WHEN THE BATTLEFIELD MOVES INTO CIVILIAN LIFE
Traditional images of war tend to separate the battlefield from civilian society. Armies confront armies, while towns and families exist behind the front.
Modern conflict rarely provides such neat geography.
Electricity grids, telecommunications, transport networks, ports, water systems and digital infrastructure are essential to civilian life, but they can also have military significance. Cities contain both civilians and military objectives. Armed groups may operate among civilian populations. Long-range weapons can strike hundreds of kilometres from a front line. Cyber operations can disrupt a service without a soldier physically approaching it.
This makes the legal principles of distinction, proportionality and precautions in attack more important, not less.
Ukraine provides a stark contemporary example.
On 24 September, UN human-rights monitors said Russian attacks had reached a new level of intensity. Between 1 and 24 September alone, they had recorded at least 200 civilians killed and 1,234 injured, with verification continuing. The attacks involved ballistic and cruise missiles, drones and guided aerial bombs and damaged homes, hospitals, shops and workplaces.
Energy infrastructure has become particularly consequential. The UN Human Rights Office documented at least 423 Russian attacks on electricity generation, transmission and distribution facilities between October 2025 and March 2026, together with at least 74 strikes on combined heat and power plants and other heating infrastructure. The resulting disruption affected households, hospitals, schools and other essential services. Moscow has argued that some energy facilities support Ukraine’s military-industrial capacity, while UN investigators have continued to scrutinise the civilian consequences and legality of such attacks.
This illustrates the problem facing international humanitarian law in contemporary warfare. Infrastructure can have both civilian and military functions. But the presence of military utility does not erase legal obligations concerning distinction, proportionality and precautions.
When electricity disappears, the consequences travel through an entire society. Water pumps may stop. Hospitals need generators. Heating fails. Businesses close. Communications are interrupted. Vulnerable people become still more vulnerable.
The target may be infrastructure. The effect is human.
GAZA AND THE LONG LIFE OF DESTRUCTION
Gaza presents a different set of circumstances and legal controversies, but it demonstrates another important reality: the consequences of war can continue long after large-scale hostilities subside.
The ceasefire that took effect in October 2025 ended large-scale hostilities and saw the return of the remaining Israeli hostages and their remains. Yet by September 2026, the United Nations reported that the ceasefire remained fragile. Israeli strikes and other military operations had continued, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups had not disarmed, and around two-thirds of Gaza remained inaccessible or subject to severe restrictions.
The devastation accumulated during the war has acquired a life of its own.
The UN reports that more than 350,000 housing units have been destroyed or damaged and approximately 1.9 million people displaced, many repeatedly. All six wastewater treatment plants were non-functional as of September, around 70 per cent of sewage pumping stations were inoperable, and most health facilities were not functioning normally. A damaged residential building collapsed in Gaza City on 16 September, killing at least 21 people, an illustration of how wartime destruction can continue taking lives even when the intensity of fighting has declined.
Responsibility within this conflict cannot be discussed selectively. Israeli military operations and restrictions affecting civilians and humanitarian operations have been subjected to sustained international scrutiny. Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups are equally bound by international humanitarian law. Deliberately attacking civilians and taking hostages are prohibited, as is using civilians to shield military objectives.
That distinction matters because the purpose of humanitarian law is not to determine which population deserves protection. Every civilian does.
Gaza also demonstrates something that may become increasingly important in future wars: destroying a civilian system can be much quicker than rebuilding it. A water network can be damaged in seconds and take years to restore. A hospital can lose equipment, staff and institutional capacity that cannot simply be replaced when a ceasefire is signed.
The cost of war therefore continues accumulating long after the weapons grow quieter.
SUDAN AND THE WARS THE WORLD SEES LESS OF
If Ukraine demonstrates the reach of missiles and drones and Gaza demonstrates the enduring consequences of urban destruction, Sudan exposes another danger: what happens when a devastating war continues without sustained global attention.
The conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces began in April 2023. More than three years later, it continues to displace civilians and destabilise large parts of the country.
The latest focus is El Obeid in North Kordofan. The UN has warned of escalating fighting, drone attacks affecting civilians and civilian infrastructure, and the danger of another major population centre experiencing large-scale violence. Both the SAF and RSF have used drones in the region, and UN human-rights officials have documented strikes affecting markets, schools, fuel stations, water infrastructure and civilian vehicles.
External involvement adds another dimension. A UN fact-finding investigation reported in September that foreign fighters, weapons and external support networks were strengthening the military capabilities of the warring parties, including through foreign-supplied drones.
Meanwhile, the human consequences are spilling across borders. The number of Sudanese crossing into Chad reportedly increased twentyfold in recent months, with more than 400 people arriving each day. Nearly one million Sudanese refugees have entered Chad since the conflict began, while funding available to support them remains severely inadequate.
This raises an uncomfortable question for the international system.
Are the restraints on warfare more easily disregarded when the victims receive less political attention?
International humanitarian law is supposed to provide the same protection whether cameras are present or absent. Yet political pressure, diplomatic intervention, humanitarian funding and accountability are inevitably influenced by how much attention a conflict receives.
The law may be universal. International attention is not.
WHEN HOSPITALS CAN NO LONGER BE ASSUMED SAFE
Perhaps no institution better illustrates the purpose of the laws of war than the hospital.
A wounded combatant can be treated. A civilian can seek medical care. Doctors and nurses are supposed to be able to perform their work without becoming participants in the conflict merely because they treat people from one side or another.
That protective space is becoming dangerously fragile.
The United Nations recorded more than 1,350 attacks on medical care across 18 conflicts during 2025. WHO’s broader monitoring system verified 1,426 attacks on healthcare in emergency-affected and fragile settings that year, associated with 1,991 deaths among healthcare workers and patients.
The damage goes far beyond the immediate casualties.
When a hospital stops functioning, cancer treatment is interrupted. Women give birth without adequate care. Children miss vaccinations. Chronic illnesses become dangerous. Doctors leave. Medical supply chains collapse. A population already traumatised by conflict becomes vulnerable to disease and preventable death.
The same applies to humanitarian workers. If ambulances, relief convoys and aid organisations cannot operate with some expectation of protection, the final buffer between civilian populations and the consequences of warfare begins to disappear.
This is why attacks affecting healthcare cannot be dismissed as simply another feature of modern conflict. They challenge one of the fundamental assumptions upon which humanitarian restraint depends.
THE NEXT BATTLEFIELD MAY NOT LOOK LIKE A BATTLEFIELD
There is another reason the present erosion of restraint should concern countries currently at peace.
The technology of warfare is changing extraordinarily quickly.
Drones have already transformed conflicts in Ukraine and Sudan. Artificial intelligence is increasingly being incorporated into military surveillance, decision-support systems, autonomous weapons and cyber capabilities. The ICRC warns that AI can accelerate the pace and scale of warfare, increase unpredictability and reduce meaningful human control over decisions involving force.
Cyber operations extend the battlefield further.
An attack need not create a crater to cause serious civilian harm. Disabling electricity, medical systems, telecommunications or essential data can disrupt an entire city. The ICRC has identified threats ranging from cyber operations against medical and humanitarian organisations to civilian hackers entering armed conflicts and technology companies providing services to belligerents.
International humanitarian law applies to these technologies. The difficulty lies in ensuring that rules developed around human decision-making and physical battlefields remain effective when algorithms assist targeting, civilian and military digital systems overlap, and decisions may need to be taken in seconds.
The danger is not technology itself. Technologies can improve accuracy, intelligence and protection.
The danger arises when technological capability develops faster than political restraint and accountability.
WHY A DISTANT WAR EVENTUALLY ARRIVES AT YOUR DOOR
It is tempting for someone living safely in Delhi, London, Toronto, Dubai or Melbourne to regard these questions as remote.
Modern economics makes that increasingly difficult.
The disruption around the Strait of Hormuz in 2026 showed how quickly warfare can travel through global markets. At the height of the disruption, ship transits through one of the world’s most important energy corridors fell by more than 95 per cent. Oil and gas prices rose, tanker freight costs increased, war-risk insurance premiums surged and fertiliser markets came under pressure. Because natural gas is essential for producing nitrogen fertilisers, an energy disruption can eventually affect agricultural costs and food prices far beyond the conflict zone.
By September, crude-oil exports through Hormuz had substantially recovered as producers developed alternative routes and transfer arrangements, demonstrating the resilience of global markets. Yet refined-product flows remained disrupted and shipping continued to carry additional security costs.
That is how modern war reaches people who have never heard an explosion.
It appears in fuel prices, airline costs, shipping charges, fertiliser bills, food inflation, investment decisions and government budgets.
Then there is migration.
When homes are destroyed and water, healthcare, schools and livelihoods disappear, people move. First within their own country, then into neighbouring states and sometimes much farther. Sudan’s refugee flows into Chad are only one contemporary example.
Receiving countries then face pressures on housing, employment, education and public services. Politics changes. Diaspora communities acquire new responsibilities towards relatives. Remittances shift. Migration becomes an electoral issue thousands of kilometres from the battlefield.
War has never respected borders completely. Globalisation has made its secondary consequences travel faster.
WHO BEARS RESPONSIBILITY?
There is no single actor responsible for the weakening of humanitarian restraint across every contemporary conflict.
That is precisely why the issue is difficult.
Russia bears responsibility for its conduct in Ukraine and is subject to international scrutiny over attacks and alleged violations. Ukraine is also bound by the same humanitarian rules in its military operations.
Israel is responsible for ensuring its military operations comply with international humanitarian law, including its obligations towards civilians. Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups remain responsible for their own conduct, including the prohibition against deliberately attacking civilians and taking hostages.
In Sudan, both the SAF and RSF are bound by humanitarian law, while UN investigations continue to document alleged and established violations arising from the conduct of the conflict.
But responsibility does not end with the forces pulling triggers or launching drones.
States supplying weapons, financing belligerents or providing diplomatic and political support also have responsibilities. The Geneva Conventions require states not only to respect international humanitarian law themselves but to ensure respect for it. Allies cannot credibly insist that the rules apply rigorously to opponents while becoming indifferent when allegations concern partners.
That principle may be among the most difficult tests facing the international order.
Rules become rules because they are applied consistently. When compliance depends upon political friendship, humanitarian law risks being perceived not as a universal standard but as another instrument of power.
THE DANGER OF PRECEDENT
The greatest long-term consequence may therefore be neither a particular missile strike nor a single destroyed building.
It is precedent.
Wars are watched closely by other militaries. They reveal which weapons work, which tactics succeed, what international reaction follows, how alliances respond and what behaviour the international community eventually tolerates.
If attacks producing severe civilian consequences are repeatedly justified as exceptional necessities, the exception can gradually become accepted practice.
If humanitarian access can routinely be restricted without meaningful consequences, others learn from it.
If civilian infrastructure can increasingly be treated as part of the battlefield, future belligerents inherit a broader understanding of what warfare permits.
If AI-assisted targeting and autonomous systems spread before clear safeguards and meaningful human responsibility are established, the next conflict may move faster than diplomacy or accountability can follow.
This is why the rules governing wars elsewhere matter even to countries that believe themselves secure today.
The precedent being created in one war may become the operating assumption of the next.
THE FLOOR BENEATH WAR
The Geneva Conventions did not abolish war. They did something both more modest and more profound.
They attempted to establish a floor beneath it.
Even enemies possess human dignity. Even military necessity has limits. Even victory does not justify everything. Even during humanity’s most violent activity, there are things that must remain unacceptable.
The world is now testing how strong that floor really is.
There are around 130 armed conflicts. Civilians are dying in homes, markets and workplaces. Healthcare is repeatedly disrupted. Drones and artificial intelligence are changing how force is delivered. Cyber operations are expanding the battlefield into the systems upon which modern civilian life depends. Wars are sending refugees across borders and economic shocks through energy, shipping and food markets.
None of this means that international humanitarian law has ceased to exist. Nor does every civilian death establish that the law has been violated. Warfare remains legally and factually complex, and allegations must be investigated rather than converted automatically into verdicts.
The greater danger is gradual normalisation.
A world that repeatedly accepts exceptions begins to change its expectations. Conduct once regarded as intolerable can become familiar. Familiarity can become resignation, and resignation can eventually weaken restraint.
The repercussions would extend far beyond today’s battlefields. They would influence how the next generation of weapons is designed, how future military commanders calculate acceptable harm, how governments treat civilian infrastructure, how humanitarian organisations operate and how other states respond when the rules are tested.
The choice is therefore not between war and an imaginary world in which conflict disappears.
It is between war with restraints and war in which those restraints progressively lose their force.
That distinction may seem distant when the battlefield is thousands of kilometres away. It will not seem distant if the precedents being established today determine how tomorrow’s wars are fought.