UNITED NATIONS, UNITED STATES  -  World leaders will descend on the United Nation’s New York HQ from Sunday for the organization’s an­nual signature gathering against an explosive backdrop of raging wars, growing populism and diplo­matic deadlock.

The war in Gaza, soaring Middle East tensions, famine conditions in Sudan’s civil war and the grinding conflict in Ukraine are among the rancorous issues on the agenda of the presidents and prime ministers attending the General Assembly’s high-level week -- the UN’s show­piece event.

But UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres insisted this week that the world would be able to “avoid mov­ing to World War Three.”

“What we are witnessing is a multi­plication of conflicts and the sense of impunity,” Guterres said at a briefing.

The gathering “could not come in a more critical and more challenging moment,” said Washington’s UN en­voy Linda Thomas-Greenfield.

“The list of crises and conflicts that demand attention and action only seem to grow and grow... it’s easy to fall into cynicism.

“But we can’t afford to do that.”

It is unclear what if anything the grand gathering, the World Cup of di­plomacy, can achieve for the millions mired in conflict and poverty globally.

With Israel’s leader Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and Iran’s new Presi­dent Masoud Pezeshkian, due to at­tend, “Gaza will obviously be the most prominent of these conflicts in terms of what leaders are saying,” said Richard Gowan of the Interna­tional Crisis Group.

He suggested the set piece diplo­matic speeches and posturing would “not actually make a great deal of dif­ference to events on the ground.”

The war in Gaza began after Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, which ultimately resulted in the deaths of more than 1,200 people, ac­cording to an AFP tally based on of­ficial Israeli figures.

More than 41,272 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s military campaign in Gaza since the war be­gan, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza. The UN has ac­knowledged these figures as reliable.

Fears are high that the conflict could boil over into Lebanon, where a series of deadly explosions appar­ently targeted Hezbollah’s commu­nications this week. Israel has yet to comment.

The action in New York begins Sun­day with a “Summit of the Future,” Guterres’ flagship attempt to get ahead of challenges that will face the world in coming years.