Obama's balancing act: Free speech v. blasphemy

A wave of Muslim rage over an anti-Islam video made in U.S. has swept the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia.

Many Americans were stunned by the images of U.S. flags burning in the Muslim world -- where U.S. President Barack Obama had focused intense personal diplomacy at the start of his term.

It is an issue he addressed before the U.N.

(SOUNDBITE) (English)U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA, SAYING:

"The attacks of the last two weeks are not simply an assault on America. They are also an assault on the very ideals upon which the United Nations was founded,"

The crisis has exposed a deep divide over the issues of free speech and blasphemy at a time when Islamist forces are on the political rise in the Middle East after several veteran dictators were ousted.

(SOUNDBITE) (English)U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA, SAYING:

"There are no words that excuse the killing of innocents. There is no video that justifies an attack on an Embassy."

Obama defended his approach to the Arab Spring but offered no detailed solutions to an array of crises that threaten to chip away at a foreign policy record that his aides hoped would be immune from Republican attack.