Hat-tip to Jim Ball for this. It was on his great website that I first saw this article by Daniel Pipes:
MIDDLE EAST FORUM: Saudi Arabian Airlines (known as Saudia) declares on its English-language website that the kingdom bans "Bibles, crucifixes, statues, carvings, items with religious symbols such as the Star of David." Until the Saudi government changes this detestable policy, its airline should be disallowed from flying into Western airports.Mark Alexander
Michael Freund brought this regulation to international attention in a recent Jerusalem Post article, "Saudis might take Bibles from tourists," in which he points out that a section on the Saudia Web site, "Customs Regulations," lists the forbidden articles above under the rubric "Items and articles belonging to religions other than Islam."
Freund followed up by calling the Saudia office in New York, where an employee identified only as "Gladys" confirmed that this rule really is applied. "Yes, sir, that is what we have heard, that it is a problem to bring these things into Saudi Arabia, so you cannot do it." An unnamed official at the Saudi consulate in New York further confirmed the regulation. "You are not allowed to bring that stuff into the kingdom. If you do, they will take it away. If it is really important to you, then you can try to bring it and just see what happens, but I don't recommend that you do so."
Responding to the Saudi ban on churches and Bibles and Stars of David, some would ban mosques, Korans, and crescent moons in the West, but that is clearly untenable and unenforceable, given the freedoms of speech and worship. The Koran, for example, is not a Saudi artifact and cannot be held hostage to Saudi policies. However closely it identifies with Islam, the Saudi government does not own the religion.
Further, as Stephen Schwartz of the Center for Islamic Pluralism points out, signs in Saudi airports warn Muslim travelers that the airport's mutawwa'in, or religious police, confiscate Korans, other Islamic literature, and Muslim objects of non-Saudi origin. While discriminating specifically against Shiites and Ahmadis, this policy manifests a wider insistence on Wahhabi supremacism. More broadly, the Saudi leadership runs a country that the American government has condemned repeatedly as having "no religious freedom" and being among the most religiously repressive in the world. Uniting to Exclude Saudi Arabian Airlines (more)
