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Pokemon Banned

Courtesy of Nintendo

Courtesy of Nintendo

It looks like you won't be traveling to Saudi Arabia to find any rare and powerful Pokemon any time soon. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) in Saudi Arabia have had it with the cutie Pikachu and his Poke-buddies.

In an effort to; "Protect the Muslims' ideology as well as their morals and their money" they're banning Pokemon from the country. You can't bring any more Poke-stuff in and if you've got any Poke-stuff they're gonna seize it.

Why? Well, the UAE have decided that playing Pokemon involves gambling and encourages non-islamic ideas.

Gambling is illegal in Islam and since Pokemon is all about winning cards from your opponent - which counts as gambling - Pokemon is illegal.

As for the non-islamic ideals - well Pokemon offends in a couple of ways. The first thing is that the Pokemon Energy symbol looks like the Star of David. The Star of David is a symbol of Israel and the Jewish people and the Muslims' don't want their kids playing with Jewish religious symbols.

The second problem is Pokemon evolution. Evolution isn't part of the Islamic religion and they don't want their kids learning un-islamic teachings.

Because of all this, the UAE has declared Saudi Arabia a no-Pokemon zone. They said that it's only a religious ban, not a legal one, but it's still bad news for all the Poke-fans living in Saudi Arabia.

What do you think of the ban? Are they right to ban Pokemon? Or do they just want all the Pokemon cards for themselves? Click to send us your opinion.

I think that they shouldn't have banned Pokemon, because kids just want to play with it and stuff.