The international community must act quickly to stop Syria's "complete destruction," U.N. leader Ban Ki-moon warned Monday as the conflict entered a third year.

Condemning the "brutal force" used by President Bashar Assad's forces over the past two years, Ban said in an anniversary statement that "today the world is watching the consequences with horror" and those responsible must face justice.

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Monday congratulated the people and president of Yemen as a national dialogue got underway that will lead to the drafting of a new constitution and elections.

Ban "commends President Abdrabuh Mansour Hadi Mansour, the government and the people of Yemen for their determination and wisdom in keeping the transition process on track against many odds," the U.N. leader's spokesman said in a statement.

Syria's main opposition National Coalition early Tuesday elected Ghassan Hitto, a former U.S.-based IT executive with Islamist leanings, as prime minister for Syrian rebel-held territory.

In a new challenge to the regime of President Bashar Assad, the Coalition appointed Hitto after some 14 hours of closed-door consultations in the Turkish city of Istanbul.

The United States is struggling to track a fragmented Syrian opposition and has found it increasingly difficult to get a clear picture of rebel factions, the U.S. military's top officer said Monday.

"About six months ago we had a very opaque understanding of the opposition and now I would say it's even more opaque," General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the Center For Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington-based think tank.

The Israeli parliament gave its seal of approval on Monday to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's new governing coalition, which includes a strong showing of pro-settlement hardliners.

A motion of confidence in the new administration, broadcast live on public television, gave it 68 votes in favor and 48 against.

A decade after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Americans remain divided over the war, with a majority believing it was a mistake, according to a poll released Monday.

The Gallup survey, the first since U.S. forces withdrew from Iraq in December 2011, showed Americans are still split over the war, with 53 percent saying they regret the decision to invade and 42 percent saying it was not a mistake.

Attacks north of Baghdad on Monday, including a car bomb detonated by a suicide bomber, killed six people just days ahead of the 10-year anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

The latest violence, which also comes with weeks ahead of the country's first elections in three years, will raise fresh questions about the capabilities of Iraq's security forces amid an apparent spike in unrest.

The United States will not oppose moves by some European nations to arm Syrian rebels battling President Bashar Assad, top U.S. diplomat John Kerry said Monday.

"President (Barack) Obama has made it clear that the United States does not stand in the way of other countries that have made a decision to provide arms, whether it's France or Britain or others," Kerry told reporters.

NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen insisted Monday that the military alliance had no intention of getting dragged into an EU debate about whether or not to supply arms to the Syrian rebels.

"This issue is a European Union question ... I have no intention whatsoever to interfere with this discussion within the EU," Rasmussen told a press conference.

The Palestinian Authority has urged the world to step up financial aid and press Israel to allow economic development, over fears of "political collapse" due to Israeli fiscal strangulation.

"We call on the international community to... pressure the government of Israel to release our revenues and to provide the financial support required to maintain basic functions and services," said a Palestinian Authority report seen by Agence France Presse on Monday.