International Relations Researches

International Relations Researches

A Historical Analysis of the Evolution of Legal Mechanisms for the Preservation of Peace, with Emphasis on the Procedures and Implications of the Gaza Case (2020–2026)

Document Type : Original Article

Authors
Mohsen Omidian Far 1
Abdolmohammad Afrogh 2
Abbas Barzegarzadeh 3
1 Phd Candidate, General International Law, Bu.C, Islamic Azad University, Bushehr, Iran
2 Department of International Law, Da.C, Islamic Azad University, Dashtestan, Bushehr, Iran
3 Department of International Law, Bu.C, Islamic Azad University, Bushehr, Iran
10.22034/irr.2026.580270.2846
Abstract
The rapid evolution of international relations over the past decade has fundamentally challenged the functionality of legal mechanisms for maintaining peace. The aim of this article is to examine the historical transformation of these mechanisms within the international legal order, focusing on the legal procedures and consequences of the Gaza crisis between 2020 and 2026. The research employs an analytical–descriptive approach using documentary and legal content analysis methods. Data were gathered from official UN documents, humanitarian organization reports, and academic sources, and analyzed through an institutional–functional transformation framework. Findings reveal that the Gaza crisis triggered a functional shift in peacekeeping mechanisms: while weakening the centralized decision-making efficiency of the Security Council, it strengthened the role of judicial institutions, international monitoring, and global public opinion as non-binding yet influential tools. Moreover, the international peace maintenance system has transitioned from a state-centric toward a multi-layered, multi-actor model. The study concludes that the Gaza crisis acted as a normative catalyst, exposing the gap between norms and implementation, and highlighting the need for structural reform, institutional coordination, and effective enforcement mechanisms. The future of the international peacekeeping system thus depends on simultaneous structural and functional transformation.
Introduction
The historical evolution of legal mechanisms for maintaining peace in the international system has consistently been shaped by a persistent tension between “norms” and “power.” On the one hand, international law—grounded in the prohibition of the use of force, the obligation to settle disputes peacefully, the protection of civilians, and the principle of accountability—claims the capacity to regulate the conduct of states and other actors in times of crisis. On the other hand, the institutional architecture of collective security and the political arrangements underpinning it often constrain, redirect, or selectively activate those norms. Within this broader landscape, the Gaza crisis between 2020 and 2026 stands out as one of the most complex and protracted arenas of contemporary conflict, functioning as a “legal mirror” in which both the capacities and shortcomings of peace-maintenance mechanisms have been revealed with unusual clarity. The continuity of the crisis over time, its severe humanitarian impact, and the multiplicity of actors involved—states, non-state armed groups, international organizations, humanitarian agencies, and transnational civil society—have challenged the conventional understanding of peace maintenance as a primarily centralized process driven by the UN Security Council or traditional peacekeeping operations. Instead, Gaza has increasingly demonstrated that peace maintenance operates as a multi-level set of arrangements ranging from norm production and legal interpretation to documentation, monitoring, accountability initiatives, and hybrid political–legal forms of pressure. In this sense, Gaza has become a setting in which the traditional boundaries between international humanitarian law, international human rights law, international criminal law, and collective security practices are continually intertwined and re-articulated. From this perspective, the core issue is not merely “which rules apply,” but rather which institutions interpret and operationalize those rules, what patterns of practice emerge in implementation, and what long-term consequences follow for the future of the legal order of peace maintenance—particularly where the gap between global normative expectations and the enforcement capacity of classical institutions becomes structurally visible. Accordingly, this article—entitled “Revisiting the Historical Transformation of Legal Mechanisms for Maintaining Peace with Emphasis on the Practices and Consequences of the Gaza Case (2020–2026)”—examines how the Gaza crisis has acted as a catalyst for functional and institutional change, and how practices ranging from resolutions and interpretive statements to fact-finding, judicial engagement, and global public mobilization have gradually reshaped the horizon of how international peace maintenance is understood and potentially reorganized. The central question, therefore, is what transformations legal peace-maintenance mechanisms have experienced in responding to the Gaza crisis, and what implications the resulting practices generate for the future of the international legal system of peace maintenance—an inquiry requiring simultaneous attention to historical trajectories, institutional structures, operational practices, and the relationship between legal legitimacy and practical effectiveness.
 
Methodology
This research is basic–analytical in purpose and descriptive–analytical in design. It employs documentary research and legal content analysis to explain the transformation of legal peace-maintenance mechanisms in relation to the Gaza crisis. A corpus of textual materials—including institutional documents and practices (such as decisions, positions, and legal framings by relevant bodies), monitoring and fact-finding reports, academic studies, and literature on the evolving concept of peace and human security—was collected and subjected to conceptual coding. The analytical strategy rested on two complementary axes: (1) historical–institutional analysis to trace shifts and redistributions of functions between classical mechanisms and complementary or alternative channels; and (2) practice-oriented analysis to identify recurring patterns in legal engagement with the crisis (including documentation techniques, normative pressure, accountability framing, and reliance on non-binding instruments). Analytical robustness was enhanced through cross-comparison of extracted themes and consistency checks across categories. Ultimately, the study’s explanatory framework links structural constraints of political decision-making with the normative and judicial dynamics that shape how peace-maintenance law is articulated and mobilized..
 
Theoretical Framework  
The Gaza crisis (2020–2026) generated a significant “functional transformation” in legal mechanisms for maintaining peace—one that occurred less through explicit amendments to Charter-based rules or the creation of entirely new institutions than through altered patterns of use and intensified interaction among existing mechanisms. The first level of change lies in the exposure of limitations within the classical collective security model centered on the UN Security Council. Under conditions of political polarization, the Council often fails to produce effective binding outcomes at key moments, which in turn activates alternative institutional pathways to compensate for decision-making paralysis. The second level involves the growing salience of “non-binding yet influential tools,” including representative-body resolutions, emergency sessions, interpretive statements, and monitoring mechanisms that operate not through coercion but through shaping normative expectations, raising reputational costs, and generating legal evidence. The third level is the gradual strengthening of judicial and quasi-judicial dimensions in the broader configuration of peace maintenance, as issues of individual criminal responsibility, accountability for serious violations, and possibilities of legal proceedings become increasingly integrated into the language through which peace is framed and pursued. The fourth level concerns a shift in the perceived “object” of peace maintenance: peace is no longer treated merely as the cessation of hostilities, but is increasingly connected in practice to civilian protection, humanitarian access, prevention of mass harm, and human rights imperatives—thereby positioning human rights and humanitarian mechanisms as active components alongside security-centered tools. The findings further show that the Gaza crisis has accelerated the multi-actor character of peace-maintenance processes, reduced the exclusivity of state-driven agendas and amplifying the influence of international bodies, civil society networks, media ecosystems, and emerging documentation technologies in shaping legal practices. Yet a structural consequence emerges as well: as normative and monitoring instruments expand, the absence of strengthened enforcement pathways increases the risk of “normative density without corresponding practical impact,” potentially undermining confidence in the overall peace-maintenance system. The Gaza case thus reflects both legal dynamism and enduring implementation constraints, illustrating the international system’s difficulty in translating humanitarian norms into effective outcomes under conditions of institutional blockage.
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Discussion
The results suggest that Gaza represents not merely an instance of institutional ineffectiveness but a turning point in the logic of change within the legal mechanisms of peace maintenance. In this crisis, peace-maintenance instruments were forced to operate amid simultaneously heightened normative pressure—from public opinion and human rights actors—and intensified structural constraints on binding political decision-making. This conjunction of “pressure to act” and “inability to compel” produced strategic adaptation: rather than relying exclusively on classical tools, the system moved toward a composite approach combining norm-setting, monitoring, judicial engagement, and political–legal diplomacy. This can be interpreted as a shift from “peace as a decision” to “peace as a process,” where each legal act—even when non-binding—may function as part of an architecture of pressure, legitimacy production, and future accountability. Such a shift carries important implications for collective security: it becomes less a singular unified response to threats to peace and more a set of coordinated actions aimed at constraining violence, reducing human harm, and raising the long-term costs of violations. However, this adaptation does not automatically guarantee effectiveness and may generate new paradoxes. One is the “inflation of soft instruments” alongside the “poverty of hard instruments,” meaning that the accumulation of reports, statements, condemnations, and monitoring processes—if not linked to actions capable of altering behavior—may gradually lose deterrent force and become repetitive and predictable. A second paradox is the tension between legal logic and political logic: as accountability and civilian protection gain prominence, political resistance by influential actors may increase, thereby weakening enforcement pathways. Gaza thus demonstrates that norms can be “resistance-generating” as much as legitimacy-producing, intensifying struggles over interpretation and implementation. The future of peace-maintenance mechanisms depends on the system’s ability to manage this tension: can institutional arrangements be designed such that, even without full consensus, minimal enforceable measures for immediate civilian protection and crisis de-escalation can be activated? Moreover, while the multi-actor nature of peace maintenance creates new capacities, it also raises the risk of fragmentation and incoherence. If institutions pursue separate narratives and agendas, the outcome may be “multiplicity of action without unity of effect.” Therefore, the central claim of this discussion is that the legal transformation observed in Gaza becomes sustainable only if it is connected to coordination mechanisms, shared standards, and implementable pathways; otherwise, the system may become normatively richer yet operationally more fragile..   
 
Conclusion
The study concludes that legal mechanisms for maintaining peace, in responding to the Gaza crisis (2020–2026), underwent three major transformations: a shift in institutional centrality, a shift in the logic of instruments, and a shift in the functional definition of peace. First, regarding institutional centrality, while the UN Security Council retains privileged legal authority, the Gaza crisis in practice highlighted complementary and alternative channels and pushed the system toward polycentricity. This polycentricity does not entail a full transfer of authority away from classical institutions but rather a redistribution of functions, where some bodies increasingly generate meaning and legitimacy, others develop documentation and monitoring, and still others activate accountability pathways. Second, in terms of instruments, peace maintenance has increasingly moved from hard, binding tools toward a combined repertoire of soft, norm-producing, and judicial mechanisms. Although such tools may not deliver immediate results, they can cumulatively increase the costs of violations, shape dominant legal narratives, and build foundations for future accountability. Yet if this shift is not accompanied by stronger enforcement, it may normalize the gap between rhetoric and practice, producing a condition in which the international community is normatively active but practically unable to interrupt cycles of violence. Third, the Gaza crisis demonstrates that peace has become a more interdisciplinary concept: no longer merely a security objective, peace is increasingly understood as an outcome shaped by humanitarian protection, access, accountability, and constraints on civilian harm. This redefinition elevates the role of human rights, humanitarian law, and international criminal law within peace-maintenance discourse and practice, expanding success metrics from “ending conflict” to “reducing human suffering and ensuring minimum protective standards.” Consequently, the legal implications of Gaza-related practices for the future peace-maintenance system can be summarized as follows: (1) the legitimacy of civilian-protection demands has strengthened and expectations of accountability have risen; (2) new pathways of normative and judicial pressure have emerged that may contribute over time to standardizing conduct and limiting practical impunity; and (3) the risk of eroding confidence in formal institutions increases if implementation deadlocks persist. The future of the legal order of peace maintenance therefore hinges on converting normative dynamism into institutional and enforcement reforms—enhancing coordination, reducing the capacity for total blockage in vital decisions, designing phased and implementable tools for immediate civilian protection, and forging effective links between documentation and accountability. Ultimately, Gaza shows that the peace-maintenance system is changing, but the transformation remains incomplete; without structural and enforcement reforms, change may remain discursive, whereas if the lessons of Gaza lead to an effective redesign of mechanisms, the crisis may mark a transition from “symbolic peace maintenance” to “implementable peace maintenance.”
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Keywords
Gaza Crisis
Peace
Historical Transformation
Legal Mechanisms
Peacekeeping
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