Originally Posted by Superpilot
The world has long been used to Saudi Arabia's requirements in order to enter Mecca (you must be a Muslim), so why should an aviation job overflying the same sites you'd be visiting on the ground be any different? Stop trying to compare this situation to the West.
Originally Posted by towerdog
Been overflying Mecca many times, all infidels in the cockpit. Never been a problem
Originally Posted by mutt
I doubt it, as it has a prohibited area around it to an unlimited altitude.
Having banned infidels from flying over Mecca, it's one thing to turn a blind eye to large passenger aircraft passing by at 35,000', but another thing entirely to actively hire one to fly at back and forth over Mecca at 1,000' and photograph the place in minute detail.
The folks on the ground who genuinely care about infidels in Mecca will never know who is flying the airliners, but at least some of them will certainly be able to read the job advertisement online, and once someone has noticed, the evidence is there for all to see.
Now, try flying over a few sensitive military bases in the USA without full authority and a background check, not merely the right citizenship or religion. Remember that religion IS intimately tied up with government and citizenship in Saudi Arabia, whether we in our comfortable secular societies like it or not.
My guess is that in the extremely unlikely situation that the US government found itself forced to contract outside pilots to photograph their
"Nevada Test and Training Range" and/or Groom Lake, aka
Area 51, they would be a tad sensitive about who exactly got to do the job too.