The news that Saudi Arabia will allow its first alcohol shop has citizens and foreigners alike mulling one question: is this a minor policy tweak, or a major upheaval?

Sources familiar with preparations for the store disclosed details of the plan on Wednesday, as a document circulated indicating just how carefully leaders of the teetotal Gulf kingdom will manage its operations.

Located in the capital’s Diplomatic Quarter, the store will be accessible only to non-Muslim diplomats, meaning that for the vast majority of Saudi Arabia’s 32 million people, nothing will change for now.
Yet like other diners at LPM, the businessman declined to be named, highlighting the sensitivity surrounding anything related to alcohol – which is banned in Islam – in the country that is home to the Muslim holy places of Mecca and Medina.

At another table, tucking into an order of hazelnut tiramisu, two Saudi men in their 30s said they worried about what the sale of alcohol would mean for the kingdom’s identity.

“It’s not who we are,” one of the men said.

“It’s not that I have, like, some kind of judgment towards people who drink. No, absolutely not. But having something that is out there affects the culture and the community.”

He added: “Let’s say if I have a younger sibling, if alcohol is out there, there is a possibility that he will become an alcoholic.”

His friend chimed in to say that he would prefer that people continue to go abroad to drink, as many do currently.
It’s just scary that they’re allowing such things into [the country]. Any individual that wants to try alcohol, it’s literally an hour by plane away,” he said.

“Everybody travels here. It’s easily accessible. But what I want to say is that in this jurisdiction, I’m not happy that it’s allowed.”

Under his Vision 2030 reform agenda, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, is trying to turn the world’s biggest crude exporter into a business, sports and tourism hub that can prosper in an eventual post-oil era.

That requires luring more foreigners, and permitting alcohol “in stages” could play a role in that, said Kristin Diwan, of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.

“This is one more step in normalising government sanction of alcohol in defined settings,” she said.

I see this as inclusiveness. Saudi Arabia wants to allow non-Muslims to eat what their religion allows.

But what about non-Muslims who are in Saudi priaons now because of the consumption and sales of alcohol? Will they be freed?

A

Las las everyone will forget religion and do as they feel like