March 28, 2006

Jail Time for Saudi Non-Muslims Who Do what the Saudi Ambassador Claimed was Permitted!

Yesterday I quoted the Saudi Ambassador to the U.S. trying to justify Saudi Arabia's use of physical violence to prevent non-Muslims from congregating in churches and synagogues:

As King Abdullah has said, and I think on American television, he said that we're pretty much like the Vatican. And one cannot imagine Muslims building a mosque inside the Vatican. Or Jews building a synagogue inside the Vatican. When the practice of religion is concerned, the regulation is that people can practice their religion in their homes any way they like. Without any hindrance. And that is the regulation in the kingdom.

(Video of the Ambassador saying this is here.) Since then great additional info on this has been posted here by several commenters.

Hexdump responds to the statements of the Saudi Ambassador:

When the practice of religion is concerned, the regulation is that people can practice their religion in their homes any way they like. Without any hindrance. And that is the regulation in the kingdom.

Baloney. I lived in Saudi 1989-1993 and my wife was active in a clandestine christian network. They would meet regularily at members houses for services. At one point the "religious police" busted one of these meetings and some were jailed and some were evicted from the Kingdom.

That's jail time and deportation, for doing what the Saudi Ambassador claimed was permitted!

James M. shows how poorly Saudi Arabia compares to Israel, on the terms used by the Saudi Ambassador:

So what he's saying is that allowing a church in Saudi would be less like Israel allowing mosques on its territory, and more like Israel allowing a mosque on the Temple Mount.

Which would be silly.

Oh, wait…

And A.M. Whittaker further exposes the facetiousness of the Ambassador's comparison of Saudi Arabia to the Vatican:

As much as I am flattered that I was quoted, I think the point of my Vatican comment was not so much that Vatican City is so small (which is a valid point and germane to the comment), but despite the fact that within its gates it might be inappropriate and unseemly to worship in any fashion other than what is prescribed by the Roman Catholic Church (the Pope being the supreme head of the church), the largest mosque in Europe is outside the gates well within the Bishop of Rome's diocese (A Diocese is the territory or churches subject to the jurisdiction of a bishop. ) i.e The King may be Catholic in his palace, but his support staff, countrymen, tenants, and visitors in his kingdom are free to worship/or not worship according to their respective consciences.