Qatar World Cup: Alcohol, extramarital-homosexual sex and Islam “promise” the Arab Emirates

The Qatar 2022 World Cup it promises to benefit not only the same, but also an unintended soft power economic, political and religious benefit for its arch-rival in the region, the United Arab Emirates.

According to a related analysis of Modern Diplomacythe UAE, along with Saudi Arabia, are leading a group of Gulf states keen to take advantage of the prospect that Qatar will not have the hotel capacity to accommodate an expected million visitors in November and December during the World Cup.

However, the UAE is going to benefit more not only financially but also politically and in terms of their religious soft power, even if Saudi Arabia does its best to catch up.

Several Gulf states have eased visa regulations and immigration procedures in the expectation that they will accommodate fans who will travel to Qatar on around 90 extra match-day flights to watch matches.

Almost half of these flights will originate from the UAE. Fans are likely to gravitate to the United Arab Emirates, the most liberal of the Gulf states, rather than the Saudi Arabia, where alcohol and extramarital and homosexual sex not only remain prohibited, but harsh laws are enforced.

In anticipation, Dubai, which already hosts a large number of hotels, announced the launch of its first 533-room football-themed hotel, which was built on an artificial island in the shape of a palm tree. For its part, Saudi Arabia is offering fans multiple-entry visas and planning a festival in an effort to compete. Saudi Arabia’s Tourism Authority says it expects to welcome 30,000 World Cup visitors.

Known as a party city, Dubai is likely to benefit most from a shortage of hotel beds in Qatar and uncertainty, less than three months before the start of the World Cup, over the ease with which fans will be able to consume alcohol and how Gulf Qatar will deal with single or gay couples.

With the premarital and same-sex ban in Qatar, Qatari officials insisted that LGBT fans would be welcome during the World Cup, but they should respect the rules in public places regardless of their sexual orientation.

Significantly, these issues, unlike in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, do not arise in the UAE, which has substantially eased access to alcohol in recent years and lifted its ban on unmarried heterosexual couples living together .(Alcoholic beer is expected to be sold at World Cup stadiums in Qatar, but fans may only be allowed to take non-alcoholic beverages into their seats).

Social reforms in the Emirates are likely to make visitors more confident that the UAE may not enforce its ban on gay sex.

However, the UAE, like Saudi Arabia, recently banned Lightyear, an animated Disney and Pixar production, because of a same-sex kiss scene, and Disney’s Doctor Strange in the Universe of Madness, in which a character refers to her “two moms”. “

The ban appeared to contradict the government’s announcement in late 2021 that it would end film censorship. The country’s Media Regulatory Bureau said it would introduce a policy to classify viewers over the age of 21. However, that wasn’t evident when the office tweeted an image of Lightyear, crossed out with a red line

From his side, the crown prince of saudi arabia mohammed bin salman he introduced major social changes in the kingdom by lifting the ban on women driving, enhancing women’s rights and opportunities, and creating a western-style entertainment sector. However, the changes are far from reforms in the UAE.

As part of his entertainment boom, Mr. Bin Salman has also sought to use the kingdom’s economic power to replace Qatar and the UAE as Gulf sports hubs.

But going to extremes to strike a balance amid a push to boost tourism, authorities in the kingdom launched “rainbow raids” in June on shops selling children’s toys and accessories.

They are targeting clothing and toys, including hair clips, pop-its, T-shirts, bows, skirts, hats and coloring pencils “that go against the Islamic faith and public morals and promote gay colors aimed at the younger generation,” a Commerce Department official said.

The Emirati liberalization was designed to boost the country’s bid to attract foreign talent and cast itself as a beacon of religious moderation, even if the changes involve social rather than religious change.

The distinction is not academic, with the UAE competing with other Muslim-majority states such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, Iran and Indonesia for recognition as a benchmark of a moderate form of Islam that would allow it to shape faith and political order in the Middle East in the 21st century.

Unlike Indonesia, where religious reform is led by the Nahadlatul Ulama, the world’s largest independent Muslim grassroots organization in the world’s largest Muslim-majority, democratic country, change in the Middle East is driven by ruling elites who want to perpetuate the their authority.

“The reality is that dictators… across the Middle East, including the UAE (President) Mohammed bin Zayed and Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman, are leveraging Islam and state-sponsored Islamic scholars to maintain their grip on political power.“, said Islamic scholar Usamaa Al. -Azmi.

Even so, Qatar’s shortcomings have created an opportunity for the UAE and, to a lesser extent, other Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia that are not co-hosting the World Cup, to share the tournament spotlight.

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