Brian Garrison lives in South Portland.

For decades, the United States helped construct an international legal order meant to restrain power and protect civilians from the worst abuses of war. It emerged from the devastation of the 20th century and rested on a hard-earned lesson: when force goes unchecked, civilians suffer first and most.

That system was never perfect. It was applied unevenly and sometimes ignored. But it existed, and it carried moral and legal weight. Today, we are witnessing something more dangerous than inconsistency. We are watching impunity become routine.

Nowhere is this more visible than in Gaza.

The United States is funding and diplomatically shielding military operations that have resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians, including an extraordinary number of children. The United Nations Human Rights Office has reported that nearly 70% of verified fatalities in Gaza have been women and children, a finding that raises serious concerns about compliance with international humanitarian law.

U.N. human rights experts have warned that the scale of civilian harm, the obstruction of humanitarian aid and the destruction of civilian infrastructure may constitute grave violations of the Geneva Conventions. Human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch, have documented incidents in which Palestinian civilians seeking food or assistance were killed in circumstances they describe as unlawful.

Rather than meaningfully engage these concerns, the prevailing response has been to dismiss them or punish the institutions raising them. When the International Criminal Court pursued accountability, it faced political retaliation instead of legal engagement. The message this sends is unmistakable: international law applies only to the weak.

This erosion does not stop at Gaza. In early January, the United States carried out a military strike in Venezuela that resulted in the capture of President Nicolás Maduro and his civilian wife, who were transported to the United States to face federal charges. The operation was conducted without international authorization and outside the framework of the United Nations Charter, prompting concern among international law experts about its legality.

Whatever one thinks of the Maduro government, this action underscores a troubling pattern. When powerful states act as though legal constraints no longer apply to them, international law ceases to function as law and becomes merely optional.

This is not a question of defending Hamas, excusing corruption in Venezuela or legitimizing authoritarian rule around the world. It is a question of whether the United States still believes that law restrains power, or whether power now defines the law.

As former United Nations human rights official Craig Mokhiber has warned, a world in which even genocide fails to trigger meaningful accountability is a world without red lines. In such a world, impunity is no longer an exception. It becomes the operating principle. And once that principle takes hold, it does not confine itself to distant conflicts or disfavored populations.

Americans should be deeply concerned by this trajectory. When legal norms collapse abroad, they do not remain abroad. They return in the form of instability, retaliation and the normalization of civilian harm. A world governed by precedent rather than principle is not safer. It is more volatile and more dangerous for everyone.

Maine has a long tradition of plain speaking and moral clarity, especially when it comes to fairness and restraint. We value the protection of the vulnerable. I believe those values still matter. Silence in the face of impunity is not neutrality. It is permission.

Gaza will be remembered. So will the broader choices being made in its shadow. The question is whether we will insist on law and accountability now, or accept a world in which power alone decides who is beyond judgment.