"The sanctions today are like leaks on a boat," said a Damascus entrepreneur who did not want to be named. "You plug one and then it leaks somewhere else. Just as we learned to live with US sanctions then the European ones, which were a brutal blow, now the Arabs jump in," he said. Europe and the United States tightened economic sanctions again on Thursday in an effort to ramp up international pressure as the UN said more than 4,000 people have died in a crackdown on dissidents across Syria. These new sanctions are about "choking the regime," a Western diplomat in Damascus said. "Economic warfare is replacing a military intervention as in Libya. "It's a war on the move. The sanctions are never fixed, they multiply and come from all directions," the diplomat explained. The Arab League confirmed their own wave of sanctions this week, but President Bashar al-Assad seems as committed as ever to take on all opposition and survive. The Arab sanctions target commercial transactions with the Syrian government, state bank accounts in the Arab region and ban all aviation links with Syria. Seventeen Syrian personalities, including Assad's brother Maher, and his despised tycoon cousin, Rami Makhluf, have had their accounts frozen and international travel banned. "The Arab sanctions also include the suspension of ties with the Syrian central bank," said a textile manufacturer who exports to Arab countries. "It's all very vague. If they include transactions, we're all hit since (international transactions) pass through the central bank," he said. Everything has become more difficult. Even banks in Lebanon, Syria's de facto financial centre, no longer open accounts for Syrians. In the US as in Europe, the slightest hint of Syria immediately freezes activity. "A client who wanted to wire money to his son in the US was refused because he lived on Damascus Street in Beirut," a Lebanese banker said. Syrian economy and trade minister Mohammed Nidal al-Shaar said Syria could survive by embracing self-sufficiency. But on its website, the European Union stresses that the purpose of sanctions is to split business from the regime. It could be working. The announcement of another sanctions list with more names targeted sends shivers through the business community. "Being on that list is practically becoming a leper," said one investor. "Those who did business with you pull away to avoid getting contaminated themselves. You have to avoid certain companies to not endanger your partners," he said. But for businessmen who have only known life under the Assads, in power since Hafez al-Assad took power in 1963, the fear of the unknown and especially the fear of brutal retribution if the regime should fall, keep them loyal to power in Damascus. "I have no sympathy for the current regime, but if they fall, as nothing is prepared, it will be total destruction," said one businessman, the latest descendant in a long line of Syrian businessmen. "The new regime will want us to cough up accusing us of getting rich thanks to our ties to the old regime," he said. Some well-heeled families have already hedged their bets: certain relatives remain true to the Assads while others embrace the opposition. "I'm wracking my brain trying to get merchandise out to the Gulf states in time for the holidays and you're calling me for this," the businesswoman chided her friend. Her friend replied: "I'm very scared by the sanctions and that we won't find botox in town." "Can you imagine the catastrophe," she added.