Senior U.N. officials may inspire awe, or perhaps fear, among the thousands of U.N. worker bees whose fate they control.

But they would hardly be considered international rock stars.

At least, that is, until now.

Singing Norwegian brothers, Bard and Jegard Ylvisaker, who host the variety show Ylvis, have produced a highly polished music video that sings the praises of the U.N.'s former emergency relief coordinator, Jan Egeland of Norway, who is currently serving as Human Rights Watch's European chief.

OK, actually, it makes fun of him.

"Gray Hair. Glasses. Suitcase. Humble. Clever. And constantly working for peace," Jegard sings in the parody homage. "Uganda. Congo. And the Oslo treaty plan. Oh my God, what a plan.'

"When hand grenades are flying there's just one man you can trust," he wails. "When there's war and all is hell; send in Jan Egeland. The United Nations superhero man."

Let's have a look:

P.S. Ban Ki-moon, if you are reading this maybe you need to talk to Psy and bring a little Gangnam Style to Turtle Bay.

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The Syrian government sought to avert an escalating military confrontation with Turkey today, offering its condolences to Turkey and the families affected by the Wednesday mortar attack, which killed a woman and four children, according to a Syrian letter to the U.N. Security Council and Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.  But Damascus stopped short of apologizing for the cross border strike against Turkey, a NATO member, and it offered no condolences to the Turkish government, reflecting the ongoing tensions between the two states.

The Syrian gesture came as NATO members convened in Brussels to consider a response to the cross border attack on a member of the organization, and Ban voiced growing concern over the risk that the confrontation might have on regional peace.

Syria's U.N. ambassador Bashar al-Jaafari, informed the U.N. in the letter that Syrian authorities "are seriously investigating" the circumstances leading up to the Wednesday mortar strike in the town of Akcakale. Regarding Turkey's military response, Jaafari noted that two Syrian Army officers were injured in a succession of artillery attacks on installations just south of the Syrian village of Tal Abiad. The Turkish barrage began at 7 p.m., stopped around midnight, and then resumed until 7 a.m. this morning. Syria did not respond to the Turkish fire.

Relations between Syria and Turkey, once close allies, have deteriorated since President Bashar al-Assad launched a violent crackdown on anti-government protesters in March 2011. The Turkish government has permitted anti-government insurgents to move weapons, cash, and other supplies across the Turkish border to rebel fighters seeking the overthrow of the Syrian regime.

Lakhdar Brahimi, the U.N.-Arab League special representative on Syria has been working with the two sides to ease tensions. The U.N. chief, meanwhile, expressed "alarm" over the standoff, saying, through his spokesman, that "the risks of regional conflict and the threat to international peace and security are also increasing."  

Brahimi said the two governments should handle the border incidents "wisely, rationally and responsibly" and asked the Turkish government  to cooperate with the Syrian authorities to impose greater controls over the border between the two countries.

Jaafari responded, saying that Syria conducts its relations with its neighbors with "rules of good neighborliness and respect for national sovereignties of states" but it expects its neighbors to "respect the national sovereignty of Syria, and to cooperate in border control and prevention of the infiltration of insurgents and terrorists."

The Syrian missive was transmitted to the council as it is weighing its response to the Syrian mortar attack. Last night, Azerbaijan introduced a statement condemning the Syrian strike as a threat to international peace and security and demanding that such acts stop immediately. But Russia, which has claimed that Syrian authorities have assured Moscow that the cross-border attack was an accident, blocked the statement's approval, and offered a competing statement that would also condemn the Syria strike but which called on both sides to "exercise restraint and avoid military clashes that could lead to further escalations."

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The U.N. Security Council has killed plans for a high-level visit to Afghanistan later this month amid concerns that conditions are too dangerous, according to Security Council diplomats familiar with the planned trip.

Germany -- which oversees Afghanistan issues in the Security Council -- had proposed leading a U.N. Security Council delegation to the country from October 20-24. But the U.N. warned that the trip -- which included a side stop in Yemen -- would run risks.

The decision to put off the trip followed a closed door Security Council briefing this afternoon by the U.N.'s top security official -- U.N. Undersecretary General Gregory Starr, who was updating the 15-nation council on security for the U.N.'s far flung missions.

Starr -- a former security chief for the U.S. State Department -- said it would be better to postpone the visit. But some diplomats said a visit would be unlikely later because the onset of winter would make travel far more difficult.

At the request of Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations -- who also favored postponing the trip -- attendance at today's meeting was restricted to the top Security Council ambassadors.

One council diplomat said that the official reason for the trip's cancellation is that no dates had ever been set and the consensus was that it would be better to postpone until the new year. But the "obvious reason," the official said, "is that you don't want to go to these dangerous places when there are threats."

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U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon today voiced alarm about Syria's possible use of chemical weapons in the course of the country's worsening civil war, saying that Syria's resort to this arsenal would constitute an "outrageous crime with dire consequences." 

Speaking in advance of a high-level U.N. meeting on the prohibition of chemical weapons, the U.N. chief today reiterated his call -- first delivered weeks ago in a letter to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad -- on Damascus to ensure the "safety and security" of the country's chemical weapons stockpile.

The remarks came three days after Defense Secretary Leon Panetta expressed concern that a small portion of Syria's chemical weapons arsenal may have gone missing during a transfer from one the country's secured chemical weapons sites. Panetta said Syrian authorities had moved the chemical weapons to ensure their security at a time when the government is battling a major armed insurgency. Panetta said that while most of Syria's chemical weapons sites were secure, he could not confirm whether the materials transferred by the government had fallen into the hands of opposition forces or Iranian forces inside the country.

It remained unclear whether Ban was simply expressing concern about the humanitarian fallout of a chemical weapons attack against Syrians or foreign governments opposed to the Assad regime, or whether he was referring to the potential of a withering military response by the United States or other Western governments in the event that the Syrian government used such weapons.

The remarks came just hours after the U.N. chief met behind closed doors with Syria's foreign minister, Walid Mouallem. Following the meeting, which took place on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly debate, Ban scolded Mouallem for his government's "killings, massive destruction, human rights abuses, and aerial and artillery attacks" against Syrian populations, and urged him to "show compassion" to Syrians who "were being killed everyday," according to a statement from Ban's office.

In a speech this afternoon before the U.N. General Assembly, Mouallem made no reference to Syria's chemical weapons program. Instead, he delivered a combative speech, accusing the United States and its allies of abetting terrorism in Syria and blatantly interfering in the country's internal affairs. He also claimed that the Syrian refugee crisis has been "fabricated" by armed groups seeking to exploit their plight to raise funds for their cause.

The Syrian diplomat's speech offered a starkly different account of realities on the ground in Syria than that described by Syrian activists, foreign journalists, the United Nations, and most Arab and Western governments, who have blamed the Syrian armed forces, and government-backed militias, for driving more than 300,000 refugees into neighboring countries, including Iraq, Jordan, and Turkey.

In contrast, Moallem urged Syrian refugees to make the trek back to Syria, promising that his government would "guarantee their safe return and their precious lives away from inhuman conditions they suffer in these camps."

"While my government is working hard to meet the basic needs of citizens who have been forced by the violence of the armed groups to flee their homes, some have sought to fabricate a refugee crisis through inciting armed groups to intimidate Syrian civilians in border areas and forcing them to flee to neighboring countries," Mouallem said. "There they are either accommodated in military training camps, or in what resembles places of detention, aimed arid or rugged regions, and exploit their plight to get aid spent mostly on goals that have no relevance to humanitarian objectives."

One Security Council diplomat dismissed the Syrian official's speech as "predictable" but "totally out of touch with reality. His points on the refugee crisis were breathtaking in their cynicism. How can he blame others for the displacement of millions while the Syrian regime is using indiscriminate shelling, aircraft and helicopter gun-ships and militia to terrorize civilians."

Mouallem acknowledged no role by Damascus in precipitating the violence in Syria, which began 19 months ago with a violent government crackdown on peaceful anti-government protesters. The conflict has since evolved into a civil war that has left more than 30,000 dead, driven 1 million from their homes and force hundreds of thousands more to flee to safety.

Mouallem told foreign delegates in New York on the final day of the U.N. General Assembly debate that his government's policies enjoy the backing of the Syrian people, and that President Assad's government remains committed to a "constructive dialogue" with the opposition in "the making of the present and the future of Syria." "The bond is very strong in my country between state policies and the aspirations of the people," Mouallem said. He said the government is currently working with "patriotic components in the opposition to build a new and pluralistic Syria that responds to the aspirations of its people."

The Syrian diplomat said, however, that his country is the victim of a neocolonial scheme, organized by the United States and its European and Arab allies, and aimed at imposing "hegemony and domination" over Syria. He said that Western-backed sanctions -- which impose hardship on ordinary Syrians - were harming the people they are purporting to protect. And he accused the United States and Britain -- "who launched wars under the pretext of combating terrorism" -- of now supporting "terrorism in my country." Under the pretext of humanitarian interventions, he said the "drums of war are beaten, and sedition and unrest are spreading."

The U.S. mission to the United Nations did not respond to request for comment.

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The Masked Avengers, the notorious Canadian radio disc jockey duo,  have struck again. Their latest victim: U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

The comic team of Marc-Antoine Audette and Sebastien Trudel is best known for tricking former GOP vice presidential nominee, Sarah Palin, three years ago into participating in a six-minute conversation with a fake French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Yesterday, in the middle of the U.N. General Assembly session, the duo placed a call to Ban, claiming that Canadian President Stephen Harper wanted to talk to him. Ban's staff pulled him out of a meeting to take the call.

Speaking in halting French, the fake Harper apologizes for not showing up for this week's General Assembly debate, explaining that he had another priority to attend to: "I was combing my hair with crazy glue," he explains in French.

"Excusé moi," Ban responds, sounding confused. "Is this Prime Minister Harper speaking?" he asks in French.

"Yes, hello, Stephen Harper speaking," the fake Harper responds, speaking now in English. "How are you Mr. Secretary General?"

"How are you, how are you?" Ban answers, sounding relieved to be speaking in English. But his confusion returns when the fake Harper appeals to the world's top diplomat to use his diplomatic skills to convince the head of the National Hockey League, Gary Bettman, to return the Quebec Nordiques (who were sold to Denver and have become the Colorado Avalanche) to Canada.

"Actually, I was calling you because the U.N. has to give the support to the return of the les Nordiques," Fake Harper explains.

"Pardon?" Ban asks.

"I was calling about the most important subject for us," Fake Harper says.

"Oh, I do not understand what you are saying," Ban says. "About what?"

"It's about the hockey team the Quebec Nordiques you have to speak to Gary Bettman to bring them back. Now it's a big situation."

A U.N. spokesman, Farhan Haq, confirmed that "the Secretary General did receive such a call and he very quickly realized it was a prank. He took it in the way it was intended -- as a joke."

"In this week of all weeks there are so many calls coming in from all over the world and from many delegations, and it was perhaps not the best use of his time, but these things can happen," Haq said. "It's obviously not supposed to happen and we will be listening out extra hard in future for poor French accents on the line from Canada."

In 2008, Audette posed as French President Nicolas Sarkozy and got a call through to Sarah Palin, just days before the U.S. election. Speaking in an exaggerated French accident, saying she would make a great president one day, and that he shared a passion with the governor for hunting.

"I just love killing those animals. Mmm, mmm, take away life, that is so fun," Fake Sarkozy told her.

"You know, I look forward to working with you and getting to meet you personally and your beautiful wife," Palin told Fake Sarkozy, referring to Carla Bruni. "Oh my goodness, you've added a lot of energy to your country with that beautiful family of yours."

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For Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu it wasn't enough just to reiterate an impassioned call for the United States and other U.N. governments to impose a red line on Iran's nuclear program.

He literally drew it -- right before the assembled world leaders -- on a crude bomb chart that looked like it came directly out Wile E. Coyote's comic book arsenal.

In a speech that briefly glossed over the Middle East process, Netanyahu made his most detailed and impassioned case for confronting Iran, clarifying that the threshold for a military strike should be set at the point Iran produces enough highly enriched uranium to produce a nuclear weapon.

"Nothing could imperil our future more than the arming of Iran with nuclear weapons," Netanyahu told the gathering of foreign leaders. "At this late hour, the only way to peacefully prevent Iran from getting an atomic bomb is by placing a clear red line on Iran's nuclear weapons programs.

"Red lines don't lead to war; red lines prevent war," he added. "I believe faced with clear red line Iran will back down."

The Israeli prime minister has been pressing President Barack Obama for weeks to specify a precise stage in Iran's enrichment of uranium that would trigger a military reaction. Obama has repeatedly said that the United States would not permit Iran to possess nuclear weapons, but he has refused to commit to a specific red line in order to preserve response flexibility.

In his speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, Obama said that while it remains committed to resolving the nuclear dispute with Iran "through diplomacy and we believe that there is still time and space to do so. But that time is not unlimited."

"Make no mistake: A nuclear-armed Iran is not a challenge that can be contained." Obama said. "It would threaten the elimination of Israel, the security of Gulf nations, and the stability of the global economy. It risks triggering a nuclear arms race in the region, and the unraveling of the Non-Proliferation Treaty."

Netanyahu thanked Obama for his statement acknowledging an Iranian nuclear weapons program could not be contained, and he said he recognized that international sanctions were inflicting serious pain on the regime.

But he said that more than a decade of sanctions and diplomacy have failed to halt Iran's nuclear ambitions, and that it would be irresponsible to place one's faith in cautious estimates from Western intelligence agencies that there is sufficient time to stop the Iranians from acquiring the bomb. "Our intelligence agents are not fool-proof," he said.

Netanyahu, who spoke shortly after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, devoted little attention to the peace process, simply saying the "libelous speeches" or "unilateral declarations of statehood" before the U.N. General Assembly would not further the cause of peace.

The Palestinian leader was the clear favorite in the General Assembly, receiving a standing ovation for a speech that denounced a wave of anti-Palestinian attacks by Jewish settlers, and claimed that Israeli policies were undermining the ability of the Palestinian National Authority to function -- threatening its ultimate collapse.

But his bid for international recognition of statehood was scaled back from a year ago.

"We will continue our efforts to obtain full membership for Palestine at the United Nations," he said. But for now, he said his government has "begun intensive consultations with various regional organizations and member states aimed at having

the General Assembly adopt a resolution considering the State of Palestine as a non-member state of the United Nations during this session."

"We do not seek to delegitimize an existing state -- that is Israel; but rather

to assert the state that must be realized -- that is Palestine."

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Burma's President Thein Sein paid tribute to the country's most famous democratic dissident, Aung San Suu Kyi, saying he wanted to congratulate her for the awards she has received during a 17-day tour the United States, including the Congressional Gold Medal.

"As a Myanmar citizen, I would like to congratulate her for the honors she has received in this country in recognition of her efforts for democracy," he told the U.N. General Assembly gathering this morning.

The tribute underscored the dramatic shift under way in Burma and in the country's leader -- a former general from the military junta that had once annulled an election that would have made Suu Kyi the country's leader, and then held her under house arrest for nearly two decades.

Dressed in a business suit, Sein said that his government is making "progress on the democratic path" and that it would require forbearance from the international community. The remarks come one day after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton informed Myanmar that the United States was easing a series of sanctions on the country's exports to the United States.

"I am well aware of the fact that Myanmar's democratic transformation process would be a complex and delicate one that requires patience," he said. "Myanmar is now ushering in a new era.... It is...necessary that Myanmar should be viewed from a different and new perspective."

He also addressed international concerns about a wave of violence against the country's minority groups, referring to an upswing in ethnic violence in Rakhine. "In this connection, I would like to mention in the first place that the people inhabiting in our country, regardless of race, religion, and gender, have the right to live in peace and security."

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President Barack Obama on Tuesday delivered an impassioned defense of the values of freedom of expression, explaining that the appearance on the Internet of a controversial film mocking the Prophet Mohammed did not justify the violent attacks on American embassies throughout the region. It was aimed at persuading the Arab Spring's new leaders that criticism against Islam, however offensive, should not be answered with violence or prohibitions on speech. It didn't work.

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy, in his first speech to the U.N. General Assembly, said today that the "obscenities" contained in the film are "unacceptable" and that ‘we will not allow anyone to do this by word or deed." He proposed that the U.N. Security Council and the U.N. General Assembly consider steps to prevent similar religious offenses.

"There are limits to the freedom of expression especially if such freedom blasphemes the beliefs of nations and defames their figures," added Yemen's President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

Over the past day and a half, speaker after speaker, from Indonesia to Qatar to Pakistan to Yemen called for the need to pass international legislation limiting the freedom of expression if it insults the religious beliefs or leaders. "Today, I would like to seize this opportunity to call on the United Nations and those of wisdom and reason and those who have the power of decisions at the international level to write internationally agreed upon laws, procedures, and controls to prevent insulting religious and faiths under any pretext and at the same time keep the right of man to know and express his opinion," said Qatar's emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani hours after Obama spoke.

Islamic countries have sought in the past to pursue the adoption of resolutions in the U.N. General Assembly and the Human Rights Council, and are likely to revive that effort in the months ahead. "A lot of these governments feel that they have to be seen doing something, even if it's a non-binding General Assembly resolution," said Bruce Jones, director of NYU's Center on International Cooperation. "It would mean precisely nothing, it would give you something to say without your domestic constituency, but it's a pretty poisonous thing."

The press for new international legislation over insults to religion marks a serious setback for American efforts to convince Islamic governments to curtail their quest to pass international blasphemy laws. It also underscored the challenges of addressing such a potentially divisive issue with a new generation of Middle East leaders whose politics are more deeply rooted in religion.

Last year, Washington marked a watershed moment in international negotiations over the issue when they convinced the Organization of the Islamic Conferences, and organization of Islamic governments, to drop a decade-long effort to adopt resolutions banning religious defamation.

"The U.N. membership finally overcame a battle that had dragged on for nearly a decade over whether insults to religion should be dealt with through bans on offensive speech," said Suzanne Nossel, president of Amnesty International, USA, who helped broker the deal when she was a senior official in the State Department. "It would be a huge step backward to devolve into opposing camps pitting concerns over freedom of expression against those of addressing religious intolerance. Offenses to religion can and must be addressed through more speech exposing such insults for what they are, not through prohibitions on speech."

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Qatar's emir Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani urged Arab nations in a General Assembly speech to form a political and military coalition to intervene in Syria to stop the bloodshed, as a first step towards guaranteeing a peaceful political transition.

"The situation in Syria has reached an unacceptable phase," he told the gathering. "Hundreds of innocent Syrians are killed everyday by the fire of a regime that does not hesitate to use all sort of weapons against its people."

The Qatari leader said the intervention force could be modeled on a Syrian-led Arab Deterrence Force that was established by the Arab League in Lebanon in 1976, and which provided regional backing to Syria's military occupation of Lebanon.

We "have used all available means to get Syria out of the cycle of killing but that was in vain," Al Thani said. "In view of this, I think it is better for the Arab countries themselves to interfere out of their national, humanitarian, political and military duties and do what is necessary to stop the bloodshed in Syria and the killing of innocent people and their displacement in order to guarantee a peaceful transition of power in Syria."

He urged countries "that believe in the cause of the Syrian people to contribute to the provision of all sorts of support to this people until it gains its legitimate rights."

It was hard to measure how serious the Qatari proposal was and doubtful that an Arab coalition could be mustered to go to war with one of the region's most powerful armies, particularly one with strong backing of Iran and Russia.  The announcement came hours after the U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon appealed to governments to stay out of the conflict and support the efforts of his special representative, Lakhdar Brahimi, to resolve the crisis through diplomatic means.

"We must stop the violence and flows of arms to both sides, and set in motion a Syrian-led transition as soon as possible," Ban said. Those remarks appeared targeted at the warring parties -- but also foreign backers, including Qatar and Saudi Arabia, who have reportedly armed the insurgents, and Russia and Iran, who are backing the government.

However, Qatar's Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim al-Thani told Christiane Amanpour this week that Qatar is not arming the rebels, but that it support a new approach -- which he called Plan B -- that would impose save havens in Syria and that "I believe there are a lot of Arab countries who will participate. And there are also European countries who will participate."

It remained unclear how much support the Arabs can expect from the West, but Bin Jassim expressed hope that Washington might support the plan if Obama wins the election. American officials have been chilly to the idea. Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, told me last week: "I'm not of the view that this is a circumstance in which external military intervention is wise for the United States or others."

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Expectations for President Barack Obama's U.N. speech this morning could not have been lower.

Entering the last leg of his presidential reelection campaign, pundits predicted a speech aimed directly at the American electorate: He would denounce Iran, denounce Syria, uphold American commitments to Israel's security, and head straight for the door.

The president did indeed high-tail it after the speech. But he left behind one of his most affecting speeches on America's relations with the Arab world since Cairo -- and it was targeted directly at the world leaders sitting in the U.N. General Assembly audience.   "Understand that America will never retreat from the world," he said, noting that the flurry of anti-American protests that followed the circulation of a video mocking the Prophet Mohammed would not drive the United States from the Middle East.

Obama opened his speech by drawing a contrast between the fallen Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens -- who was killed in an attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya, "the city he helped to save" -- and the forces of extremism who murdered him, three other American nationals, and an even larger number of Libyan security guards which offer nothing to the millions of Muslims seeking a better life and better leaders. "Chris Stevens embodied the best of America. Like his fellow Foreign Service officers, he built bridges across oceans and cultures," Obama said. "Burning an American flag will do nothing to educate a child.... Attacking an embassy won't create a single job."

The broader point of Obama's speech was to drive home the message that the region's new Islamic leaders, including Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy, must move more assertively to stem the tide of extremism or see it swallow up their achievements. In a remark that appeared directed at Morsy, Obama said the United States "has not, and will not, seek to dictate the outcome of democratic transitions abroad, and we do not expect other nations to agree with us on every issue."

In an interview with the New York Times on the eve of the U.N. General Assembly, Morsy had sharply criticized America's role in the Middle East, saying that U.S. support for generations of military dictatorships, and its backing of Israel, had fueled anti-American sentiment in the region.

Obama responded today that all leaders have "an obligation" to "speak out forcefully against violence and extremism" and marginalize those who "use hatred of America or the West, or Israel as a central principle of politics."

"A politics based only on anger -- one based on dividing the world between us and them -- not only sets back international cooperation, it ultimately undermines those who tolerate it," he added. "The impulse towards intolerance and violence may initially be focused on the West, but over time it cannot be contained."

Obama also took aim at the history of violent reactions across the Muslim world to offensive portrayals of Islam in the West, saying that while "we understand people take offense to this video ... there is no speech that justifies mindless violence."

"There is no video that justifies an attack on an embassy," said Obama. "There is no slander that provides an excuse for people to burn a restaurant in Lebanon, or destroy a school in Tunis, or cause death and destruction in Pakistan," he added. "Like me, the majority of Americans are Christian, and yet we do not ban blasphemy against our most sacred beliefs."

"I expect that people are going to call me awful things every day, and I will defend their right to do so," he said. "We do so not because we support hateful speech, but because our founders understood that without such protections, the capacity of each individual to express their own views, and practice their own faith may be threatened."

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Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, the first national speaker at the U.N. General Assembly today, delivered a broadside against the United States, blasting Washington for subjecting “Dear Cuba” to an economic embargo that has “chastised” its people for too long. “Time has come to end this anachronistic” measure that enjoys virtually no support in the U.N. community, she said in remarks that veered from her official distributed speech. Rousseff also took aim at the West for its colonial past and for its failure to stop a wave of Islamophobia.

Follow me on Twitter @columlynch and stay tuned to Turtle Bay for breaking news from the General Assembly. 

The world's annual diplomatic gab-fest -- the U.N. General Assembly debate -- opens on Manhattan's East River tomorrow against a backdrop of deepening civil war in Syria, nuclear-tipped confrontation between Israel and Iran, and nagging questions about whether a recent wave of anti-American protests was a blip or portends darker diplomatic days ahead for the United States and its Western partners.

The U.N. session will offer world leaders an opportunity to take stock of the health of the democratic movement, known as the Arab Spring, that has swept through North Africa and the Middle East over the past year and a half, toppling dictatorships in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, and dealing an existential challenge to the Assad dynasty's decades-long rule in Syria.

For the first time, the region's old guard, including Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, will cross paths in the U.N. corridors with the region's new leaders, including Egypt's Mohamed Morsy and Libya's Mohammed Magarief.

As world leaders from 193 countries converged on midtown, swelling the East Side's most luxurious hotels, the U.N. and Arab League representative, Lakhdar Brahimi, offered a downbeat assessment of the prospects for peace in Syria, while the Iranian leader took swipes at Israel in a series of interviews with American editors and journalists, accusing the Jewish state of trying to bully America into a war with Iran. Israel's U.N. delegations, meanwhile, staged a walk-out from a high-level U.N. meeting on the rule of law after Ahmadinejad denounced the Zionist state.

In a rare snub to visiting dignitaries, President Barack Obama will avoid conducting the customary bilateral meetings with foreign counterparts, appearing only briefly at U.N. headquarters to deliver his address to the General Assembly. From there, he'll head crosstown, where he will speak at the Clinton Global Initiative conference hosted by former President Bill Clinton. He will, however, host a dinner for visiting leaders at the Waldorf Astoria hotel on Tuesday night.

"The president just in recent weeks has had intensive consultations with leaders in the region, with the leaders of Turkey, of Egypt, of Israel, of Yemen, of Libya, of Afghanistan, and that process will continue," White House spokesman Jay Carney said. "It is a simple fact that when you're president of the United States, your responsibility as commander-in-chief never ends and you are constantly engaged in matters of foreign affairs and national security. And that's what this president is doing."

The Iranian leader sought to set the tone for this year's debate, launching his final appearance in New York as Iran's president with a series of interviews with American columnists, editors, and reporters. At a breakfast this morning, Ahmadinejad said that Israel, which he refers to only as "Zionists," was bullying the Americans into a clash with Iran. "Is it the Zionists who must tell the United States government what to do, such as form a red line on Iran's nuclear issue and the United States government must make such vital decision under the influence of the Zionists?"

Israel's U.N. ambassador, Ron Prosor, meanwhile, walked out of a high-level U.N. meeting promoting the rule of law. "Ahmadinejad heads a state that is the most systematic violator of international law and the world's greatest sponsor of terrorism," he said in a statement after the walkout. "It is shameful, disgraceful, and absurd that his voice was part of today's U.N. discussion on the rule of law."

Netanyahu, who is scheduled to speak on Thursday, is expected to deliver a combative speech denouncing Iran's nuclear activities, pressing the U.N. membership to confront the regime before it obtains a nuclear weapon. 

Behind the nuclear standoff, there were competing narratives over the state of America's relations with the Middle East's new leaders.

The new Libyan leader's attendance at the U.N. underscored the prospects for improving America's standing in the region. And Magarief, the head of Libya's national congress, today struck a conciliatory note, apologizing directly to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday for his government's failure to halt the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. consulate, which left four Americans dead, including the U.S. ambassador J. Christopher Stevens. "What happened on 11th of September towards these U.S. citizens does not express in any way the conscience of the Libyan people, their aspirations, their hopes or their sentiments towards the American people," Magarief told Clinton today, according to Reuters. "Of course we ... express our great readiness to cooperate with the U.S. government in order to cooperate in the investigation and bring those perpetrators to justice."

Morsy, meanwhile, was not interested in offering comfort to America, which he suggested bore the burden of improving its poor standing in the region. Egypt's Islamist leader defended his government's tepid first response to the protests at the U.S. embassy in Cairo, telling the New York Times that "we took our time" to avoid a violent reaction by the protesters, but later dealt "decisively" with them. "We can never condone this violence but we need to deal with the situation wisely,' Morsy said.

The Egyptian leader also told the New York Times that the United States had earned its bad reputation in the Middle East by backing generations of military dictatorships and Israeli policies toward the Palestinians. "Successive American administrations essentially purchased with American taxpayer money the dislike, if not the hatred, of the peoples of the region."

But the issue weighing most heavily over the U.N. membership was Syria, where nearly a year's worth of Arab League and U.N.-based diplomacy has failed to halt a brutal government crackdown on anti-regime protesters. The crisis in Syria, which began as a peaceful popular call for change, has deteriorated into all-out civil war, with thousands dead, mostly civilians killed by government forces, and the emergence of extremist elements seeking to take advantage of the chaos.

In advance of the General Assembly debate, U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi provided the U.N. Security Council with a downbeat assessment of peace prospects in Syria, saying that he would be powerless to avert worsening civil and sectarian strife as long as the U.N.'s biggest powers, including the United States and Russia, remained divided.

The veteran U.N. trouble-shooter also sent a strong message to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, saying that his promise to bring government-sponsored reforms would not be enough to stem the spreading violence in Syria. "I think there is no disagreement that the situation is extremely bad and getting worse," Brahimi told reporters after the meeting. "I refuse to believe that reasonable people do not see that you cannot go backward; you cannot go back to the Syria of the past. I think I told everybody in Damascus and elsewhere that reform is not enough. What is needed is change."

Despite the grim report, Brahimi offered his first sliver of hope, saying that while there are "no prospects" for diplomatic progress in the immediate future, his travel to the region had given him cause to believe "we will find an opening in the not too distant future."

After the meeting, Brahimi told reporters that the situation in Syria "is extremely difficult. There is a stalemate; there is no prospect for today or tomorrow to move forward." But he also raised a hopeful note over the prospects for future progress, saying that a recent visit to the region, including a meeting with Assad, had convinced him that "I think we will find and opening in the not too distant future."

Brahimi's remarks, which followed the former Algerian diplomat's first briefing to the Security Council on Syria, reflected a growing consensus among U.N. officials and some Arab leaders that the only hope of easing the crisis would require some sort of agreement between Russia and the West on a process for political transition in Syria. "If I do not represent the entire council I am nothing," Brahimi told reporters. "I need to be seen to represent a united council and a united League of Arab States and I think the Security Council understands that perfectly well."

Brahimi said he would use the occasion of the General Assembly debate to consult with key regional and international leaders in New York before returning to the region. For the time being, Brahimi said he had no fixed peace plan for Syria, but that "I do have a few ideas" that he intends to discuss with key foreign powers in New York this week.

The U.N. Security Council has remained at a stalemate on Syria since July, when Russia and China cast vetoes -- their third on Syria -- on a resolution that outlined a blueprint for the establishment of a national transition government, which threatened sanctions against Damascus if it failed to halt its attacks on residential areas.

Behind closed doors, Brahimi told the 15-nation Security Council that he saw few signs that either Assad or the fragmented armed opposition are currently prepared to engage in substantive peace talks, according to council diplomat present.

"On the side of the government, the aim is still to keep, or return to, the old Syria, even if much is said about dialogue and reform," Brahimi told the council. "Popular demand for change, not reforms, is hardly recognized by the government. The crisis is seen mainly as a foreign conspiracy engineered from abroad."

The Syrian government, Brahimi told the Security Council, continues to dismiss the role of popular unrest in fueling anti-government sentiment, arguing that Damascus is the victim of a foreign conspiracy, and that its troops are up against as many as 5,000 foreign fighters. The armed opposition, meanwhile, maintains the current rebellion is the result of four decades of state-terror against the people.

"They say there is no turning back," Brahimi told the council. "Indeed, it bears repeating that the solution to Syria's problems demands a clean break with the past."

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The United Nations marked the death of U.S. Ambassador John Christopher Stevens, Sean Smith, and two other American nationals in Benghazi, Libya, with the customary expressions of condolence invoked when a U.N. member state endures a national tragedy.

The U.N. Security Council duly condemned the "heinous" murder of the American diplomatic delegation. A "saddened" U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon offered his condolences to the United States government and the "bereaved Libyan and American families." And other council diplomats expressed their somber regrets at the untimely murder of colleagues.

But this time, the killing struck closer to home. U.N. Undersecretary General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feltman, who served until recently as the U.S. assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs, was a close personal friend and colleague of Stevens at the U.S. State Department.

The U.N. Security Council had played a vital role in shielding Benghazi's residents from certain slaughter at the hands of Muammar al-Qaddafi's forces. In a rare, brief show of unity, the Security Council authorized NATO to use air power against Libyan forces, a move that until led to Qaddafi's overthrow.

The U.S. consulate in Benghazi and the U.S. embassy in Cairo both came under attack from mobs that had allegedly become enraged over the circulation on the Internet of an inflammatory film produced by a man in California who claimed in an interview with the Associated Press that he was an Israeli filmmaker. (The AP has raised questions about his true nationality) But U.S. officials said that the attack in Benghazi may have been planned by extremists inspired by al Qaeda, according to a report in the Washington Post.

After the attack, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asked the question that was on the minds of many of the U.N.'s Western diplomats. "How could this happen in a country we helped liberate, in a city we helped save from destruction?" she said. "This question reflects just how complicated and, at times, how confounding the world can be."

Speaking outside the U.N. Security Council, Libya's U.N. ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi conveyed his own government's condolences to the United States and the families of the dead, saying that Stevens had "been a real friend for the Libyan people."

Stevens, he added, "was with us during our fighting against the dictator Qaddafi and his forces. He was very brave in staying in Benghazi."

Dabbashi was at a lost to explain how the ambassador of a government that had supported Libya's liberation could become a target. "As you know, we have to state the reality: the authority of the government is still not covering the whole territory of Libya."

Dabbashi said his government would take "the necessary measures to contain those people ... and bring them to justice." He said that as many as 10 Libyan security forces were either injured or killed during the attack.

Inside the council, the mood was somber as Rosemary di Carlo, the U.S. deputy permanent representative, read out an account of the attack and requested support for a U.S.-drafted Security Council statement condemning the attack. Russia and other delegations that have frequently criticized U.S. backed initiatives on Libya were silent, according to a council diplomat. "Even the hardliners were subdued," the diplomat said. "I think nobody wanted to be in Rosemary's shoes, talking about the death of a colleague."

"The senselessness of if was striking," the official said. "This was not a war; these were people who had committed themselves to the well being of the Libyan people."

But the attack also raised concern among other diplomats about the future of their efforts in Libya, and the persistent diplomatic risks. In April, unidentified attackers targeted a convoy transporting the U.N.'s special representative, Ian Martin, with a roadside bomb. In June, armed groups attacked a British convoy carrying Britain's ambassador to Libya, Dominic Asquith. The British envoy was not armed, but two British bodyguards were injured. 

For now, it remains unclear what impact, if any, Stevens' death will have on the future of the U.N. mission in Libya. "It is too soon to assess the implications for our future posture -- our policy has been to keep a low profile," said one senior U.N. official. Restoring stability in Libya, the official said, will depend on the effectiveness of the country's new prime minister, Mustafa Abu Shagour, who won by a slim margin in a vote today. "The events in Benghazi showed everybody that there are still a lot of challenges out there," said the council diplomat.

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The U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, and his predecessor, Kofi Annan, have toiled in the cause of peace in Syria this year. So it's perhaps not a surprise that they would be nominated for an international peace prize. But this is one award they will not likely be bragging about if they win.

"It's not like you would campaign for this," quipped one U.N. official. "At least I hope no one is campaigning for this."

The organizers of the Confucius Peace Prize this weekend announced the nomination of the U.N. luminaries, along with Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and several others for a prize that awarded last year to Russian President Vladimir Putin -- in recognition of his opposition to the NATO-led bombing campaign in Libya, and which praised his military campaigns in Chechnya and Georgia.

"These were righteous wars," the Confucius Peace Prize committee co-founder and president, Qiao Damo, told the New York Times last year. Human rights advocates have differed, accusing Putin's forces and proxies of engaging in large-scale rights abuses.

The Chinese prize was established as Beijing's answer to the decision to honor Liu Xiaobo, the jailed pro-democracy dissident, in 2010 with the Nobel Peace Prize.

The selection of Liu infuriated the Chinese government, and prompted a Chinese banker, Liu Zhiqin, to propose that China establish the Confucius Peace Prize to counteract what he characterized as the West's anti-Chinese bias and to highlight China's "views on peace and human rights."

"The Nobel Peace prize won Liu Xiaobo while losing the trust of 1.3 billion Chinese people," Liu Zhiqin wrote in a November 2010 opinion piece. "They support a criminal while creating 1.3 billion 'dissidents' that are dissatisfied with the Nobel Committee, which is definitely a bad decision."

The effort to establish the prize's legitimacy has been rocky.

The committee's first award recipient, Lien Chan, a Taiwanese politician who promoted improved ties between China and Taiwan, did not show up at the awards ceremony, saying he'd never heard of the award, and even Putin's press office told reporters they didn't know much about the report, according to the New York Times.

The Chinese government meanwhile criticized the committee organizers for suggesting they were linked to the Chinese Ministry of Culture. But the prize lives on.

This year' s other nominees include Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, Chinese social activist Wang Dingguo, Peking University Prof. Tang Yijie, Chinese rice researcher Yuan Longping.

A spokesman for Ban, Farhan Haq, said that any decision on whether Ban or Annan would accept the prize, if awarded, is hypothetical since the winner has not been announced. But he says that secretaries general frequently do accept awards on the behalf of the United Nations, donating cash awards to humanitarian causes.

But Ban and Annan still face stiff competition from another nominee -- China's choice to inherit the title of Tibet's spiritual leader, known as the 11th Panchen Lama, when the current Dalai Lama dies. The Dalai Lama anointed another heir back in 1995, a six-year old boy who was subsequently taken into "protective custody" by the Chinese government and never seen in public again.

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