Mark Dubowitz

The European Union, which buys 90% of Syria's oil exports, has slapped sanctions on the nation's oil and gas industry, but loopholes allow European energy companies to pull back only gradually from buying heavy crude or doing lucrative work in Syrian oil fields. Syria's other key trading partners, including Turkey, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon, have maintained economic ties with Damascus even as Syrian troops and tanks have killed thousands of people since a popular uprising began in March.

The Obama administration said it was "actively" considering sanctioning Iran's central bank in retaliation for an alleged Iranian assassination plot, a move that could severely damage Iran's economy and potentially provoke a strong response from Tehran. David Cohen, the Treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, told the Senate Banking Committee that officials were "looking very actively" at such a step and might carry it out if other nations could be persuaded to follow suit.

The Obama administration, which labored for months to impose tough new United Nations sanctions against Iran, now is pushing in the opposite direction against Congress as it crafts U.S. sanctions that the White House fears may go too far. Administration officials have begun negotiations with congressional leaders, who are working on versions of House and Senate bills that would punish companies that sell refined petroleum products to Iran or...

These days Saadi Kadafi is on the run, presumably somewhere in North Africa, dodging the rebels who ended his father's 42-year-long dictatorship in Libya. But just two years ago this month, the 38-year-old third son of Moammar Kadafi was perched on a couch surrounded by Champagne bottles, holding court at a glittering rooftop party at the Toronto International Film Festival. As rapper 50 Cent performed and guests sampled Beluga caviar, Kadafi and his American partner, Matty Beckerman, schmoozed with agents to promote themselves as the newest players in the world of independent filmmaking.

Even as the White House praised Russia for declining to sell antiaircraft missiles to Iran in violation of U.N. sanctions, Russian diplomats were quietly recruiting other countries this week to undercut tougher penalties imposed on the Islamic Republic. Russia supported weak United Nations sanctions approved in June to pressure Iran over its nuclear program. But it has strongly objected to tougher sanctions added individually by the United States, the European Union and four other countries.

Efforts by the United States and its European allies to build a united front to halt Iran's nuclear program are facing increasingly bold resistance from China, Russia, India and Turkey, which are rushing to boost their economies by seizing investment opportunities in defiance of sanctions imposed by the West. The Obama administration and the European Union opted to try to toughen United Nations sanctions against Iran with their own unilateral restrictions on foreign companies that do business with Tehran's energy sector, hoping that squeezing the country's most lucrative industry can force the Islamist government to bend on its nuclear program.