FaceTime missing from Apple’s iPhone webpages for Middle East

According to a post by TUAW, FaceTime has mysteriously gone missing from Apple’s iPhone 4 web pages for countries in the Middle East.
TUAW points to a thread on SaudiMac’s Facebook page which points out that the pages on Apple’s web site with country-specific information about iPhone 4 apparently have been edited recently and FaceTime has been removed from the main graphic as well as from the list of features mentioned below the graphic. In the cached earlier version you can see FaceTime but in the current version you can not (this shows the Saudi Arabia pages but it seems to be the same for Egypt, U.A.E., Qatar, and Jordan.

It should be noted that not Apple nor any of the telecommunications providers expected to carry iPhone 4 in the Middle East have said anything about FaceTime not being supported. In fact, many current iPhone 4 owners say that FaceTime works just fine on carriers including Etisalat in U.A.E.

FaceTime is still present on Vodafone Qatar’s webpage where interested customers can pre-register their interest for iPhone 4.

Since VoIP is a tricky issue in most of the Middle East it may be that Apple’s been asked not to promote FaceTime. It’s also possible, although there is no proof of it at this time, that telcos have been asked to block ports, protocols or something else used by FaceTime.

In the U.A.E. only official telecommunications licensees approved by the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) are allowed to offer VoIP services. Although it’s been rumored that telcos have been in talks with Skype to offer some type of VoIP to their customers nothing so far has materialized. Video calling or video conferencing is usually not mentioned but presumably it would fall under the same regulation as VoIP.

Etisalat has said they will start selling iPhone 4 in the U.A.E. starting this coming Saturday, September 25. Vodafone Qatar as well as Egypt have tweeted to say that they will offer iPhone 4 “soon.” In Qatar interested customers can pre-register and customers in Egypt can register their interest to know know when iPhone 4 arrives there. In Saudi Arabia, Mobily’s CIO has said that “the countdown has begun.”

Update: It should be pointed out that any iPhone 4 users who report FaceTime is working for them are using gray market iPhones since the latest Apple smartphone is not officially launched in the Middle East yet.