On November 19, 2018, Airbnb announced its decision to stop offering listings located in settlements on its website. In the months leading up to its decision, we worked with Human Rights Watch on an extensive report reviewing the activities of two international companies who offer search engines through which listings may be found in settlements among other locations: namely Airbnb and Booking.com.

 

The report 'Bed and Breakfast on Stolen Land' was published the day after Airbnb publicly announced its decision, and maps all the listings offered on these companies' sites, for the first time. The report provides information about 139 properties that Airbnb listed in Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, not including East Jerusalem, at various times between March 22, 2018 and July 6, 2018, and 26 properties listed by Booking.com as of July 2018, with five properties cross-listed. It analyzes the status of the land on which those properties are located, including 17 properties built on land that the Israeli authorities acknowledge is privately owned by Palestinians but has been taken over for the exclusive use of Israeli settlers.

 

Under the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, businesses have responsibilities to refrain from contributing to serious abuses, even if, in extreme cases, that means ceasing their business operations in a particular area or context. In the view of Human Rights Watch and Kerem Navot, the violations of international human rights and international humanitarian law in Israeli settlements are so pervasive, that in order to comply with their human rights responsibilities, Airbnb and Booking.com should stop listing properties there.