West Texas Intermediate crude climbed from the lowest price in more than a week as a U.S. Senate committee approved military strikes on Syria, heightening the threat of a wider conflict in the Middle East.

Futures advanced as much as 0.8 percent in New York after falling by the most in two weeks yesterday. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted to authorize President Barack Obama to conduct a restricted operation following the alleged use of chemical weapons by President Bashar al-Assad, clearing the way for consideration by the full Senate. U.S. crude stockpiles shrank by 2 million barrels last week, according to a Bloomberg News survey of analysts before government data today.

WTI for October delivery increased as much as 81 cents to $108.04 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, and was at $107.86 at 1:29 p.m. London time. The contract dropped 1.2 percent to $107.23 yesterday, the biggest decline since Aug. 20 and the lowest settlement since Aug. 26. The volume of all futures traded was about 50 percent below the 100-day average.

Brent for October settlement was 40 cents higher at $115.31 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. The European benchmark crude was at a premium of $7.39 to WTI, compared with $7.68 yesterday.

Gold prices are falling for the fourth time in five sessions because of the dollar after data on unemployment and activity in the U.S. service sector .

According to recent reports, which were submitted to the Department of Labor , at the end of last week, the number of those who applied for a first time unemployment benefits fell moderately , reaching with levels seen before the recession .

The report showed that for the week ended Aug. 31 , the number of initial claims for unemployment benefits fell to a seasonally adjusted at 9000 , down to the level of 323 thousand Many economists predicted that this figure will drop to 330 thousand from 332 thousand , of which initially reported last week. We add that the number of complaints varies near five-year low since the end of July.

Meanwhile, it was reported that the average number of claims for the past four weeks was 328.5 thousand, which is 3,000 less than was recorded in the previous week. Note that the latter figure was the lowest since October 2007 , which was several months before the start of the last recession .

Economic activity in the non-manufacturing sector in the U.S. rose in August, the growth continues the 44th month in a row - according to national survey of managers conducted by ISM. The index of non-manufacturing sector rose to 56.0 % in July to 58.6 % in August. This shows that the growth in the non-manufacturing sector accelerated. The August with the maximum value of the index in January 2008

The cost of the October gold futures on COMEX today dropped to $ 1364.50 per ounce.

GOLD 1,393.90 -17.80 -1.26%

OIL (WTI) 107.34 -1.20 -1.11%