... but that the government had just made the practice "illegal," and that these methods were part of the past now.

I succeeded in even obtaining an official document, shown here, which indicates clearly in English and Arabic, that since September 2003, the hotels and other accommodations no longer have the right to keep foreigner's passports!

In practice, in the weeks that followed, I still had to fight more than once in order to keep my passport.

Fortunately, this document was invaluable.

Moral of that story:
don't give up!