Booking.com logo
#Travel, Bookings & Reservations

Booking.com

Booking.com is an online travel agency and accommodation booking platform. It allows users to search for and book a range of travel services, including hotels, vacation rentals, hostels, apartments, and other lodging options. Booking.com is part of the Booking Holdings group and offers additional services such as car rentals, flight bookings, and travel packages.

Isreal and Apartheid

Booking.com offers listings of accommodation in illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian and Syrian land in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Golan Heights.

Breaking International Law

Booking.com was included in the UN Database of businesses engaged in activities related to the Israeli settlements. This database was created following an independent international fact-finding mission, which aimed to investigate the impact of these settlements on the civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem. Despite the publication of this report in February 2020, Booking.com has continued its operations and continues to benefit from activities in these occupied territories to this day.

A 2018 Human Rights Watch report concluded that

The business activity that Airbnb and Booking.com conduct helps make West Bank settlements more profitable and therefore sustainable, thus facilitating Israel’s unlawful transfer of its citizens to the settlements. In many cases, the companies list the properties as being located inside Israel, thereby misleading guests about where they will be staying and obscuring the fact that their payments are benefitting the settlement enterprise. [...] Israeli settlements in the West Bank are the only example in the world today that Human Rights Watch and Kerem Navot found in which Airbnb hosts would be mandated by law to discriminate against guests based on national or ethnic origin.

The rental properties listed by Airbnb and Booking.com in the settlements are available to guests under discriminatory conditions. Israeli citizens and residents, holders of Israeli entry visas, and even people of Jewish descent are permitted to enter the settlements, while Palestinian residents of the West Bank are barred from doing so.

When confronted by Human Rights Watch, Peter Lochbihler, Director of Public Affairs at Booking.com, stated that the company could not provide detailed responses to HRW's queries, including the mislisting of some settlement properties as being in Israel. He claimed that Booking.com does not support the maintenance of settlements and emphasized the company's commitment to "inclusive growth" and empowering local communities. However, despite these claims, Booking.com profits from properties on unlawfully seized land, thereby supporting the economic sustainability of Israeli settlements and contributing to their perceived legitimacy.

The Case Against Booking.com

Despite efforts by human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch to hold Booking.com accountable for contributing to crimes against Palestinians, the company has continued its business activities in occupied areas. Booking.com has ignored numerous calls from both Palestinian and international civil society groups to cease promoting and facilitating rentals in illegal settlements. This ongoing involvement led the United Nations to include Booking.com in a database of companies that benefit from and support the maintenance and expansion of Israeli settlements.

According to international law, and as recognized by bodies such as the International Court of Justice and the Dutch government, Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are illegal and involve multiple war crimes. Booking.com’s profits from these activities fall under the scope of Dutch financial crimes legislation, potentially implicating the company in money laundering as these illicit funds are channeled into the Dutch financial system. This is what led a collective of European and Palestinian NGOs to file a criminal complaint against Booking.com in The Netherlands.

Sources: