‘Stop Booking Apartheid’ targets Booking.com’s Israeli settlement profits
A coalition of workers and activists has launched a campaign targeting online travel agency Booking.com, which they accuse of profiting from Israeli war crimes.
The “Stop Booking Apartheid” campaign, led by Palestinian and left-wing organisations including Progressive International and BDS Netherlands, is targeting Booking.com’s 55 listings in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.
The travel site, which is headquartered in the Netherlands and has a parent company in the US, also lists sites in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.
Israeli settlements built on stolen Palestinian land are considered illegal under international law.
Booking.com has featured listings in 12 different illegal West Bank settlements, seven settlement neighbourhoods in occupied East Jerusalem, and 28 settlements in the Syrian Golan Heights.
Launched on Friday, the “Stop Booking Apartheid” campaign is also led by No Tech for Apartheid, a coalition of Google and Amazon workers campaigning against the companies’ involvement with Israel, and B.WorkersforPalestine, a newly formed group made up of Booking.com workers in response to the “internal repression of Palestine solidarity in Booking.com”.
‘They want us to pretend that providing war criminals with a revenue stream is business as usual’
– Booking.com worker
“We wish more of our co-workers realised what the company is really asking of us,” one Booking.com worker, a member of the group, said.
“They want us to pretend that providing war criminals with a revenue stream is business as usual. It’s time to put an end to this complicity – or else Booking.com becomes a shameful, indelible stain on our resumes and conscience.”
Kimia Talebi, the Watermelon Index organiser for Progressive International, added: “Booking.com workers are refusing to be complicit in the displacement of Palestinians, yet they are being silenced and ignored by the company. Workers have a right to know about the legal risks posed to them in processing illegal settlements.”
Booking.com did not respond to Middle East Eye’s request for comment by time of publication. In 2024, Booking Holdings recorded a gross profit of $23.7bn. Its CEO is American former investment banker Glenn Fogel.
UN illegal settlement database
On 8 May, Stop Booking Apartheid will carry out a day of action at Booking.com offices around the world, including at the company’s headquarters in Amsterdam and in Manchester, northern England.
Booking.com BV and its parent company, Booking Holdings Inc, which is incorporated in the US tax haven state of Delaware, are both listed on the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights database of businesses operating in Israeli settlements.
Companies are placed on this database if they engage in any number of listed activities, including the “provision of services and utilities supporting the maintenance and existence of settlements”, “the supply of equipment for the demolition of housing and property”, and the “use of natural resources, in particular water and land, for business purposes”.
Like Expedia and Airbnb, Booking.com is included in the database for facilitating tourism and hospitality services in the settlements.
In 2022, Booking.com said it would introduce a warning for customers visiting listings in Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.
But a brief search conducted by Middle East Eye revealed locations in Israeli settlements listed without any such warning, just the inclusion of “Israeli settlement” in the address, with some advertising that they are “excellent” or “good” locations.
One such listing includes a set of rave reviews, the most recent of which lauds the “stunning location” and “biblical views”.
In February, analysis carried out by the Guardian found 760 rooms being advertised in hotels, apartments and other holiday rentals in illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, on Booking.com and Airbnb.
Dutch NGO Somo said it found that Booking.com had listed 70 properties in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank between 2021 and 2023.
Somo accused Booking.com of violating the Netherlands’ anti-money laundering rules by profiting from listings in illegal Israeli settlements.
In May last year, legal and human rights groups in the Netherlands filed a criminal complaint against Booking.com to hold it “to account for profiting from the commission of war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territory”.
At the time, Booking.com denied the claims and said there are no laws prohibiting listings in Israeli settlements, adding that various US state laws would prohibit divesting from the region.
Japanese guesthouse suspended
The Stop Booking Apartheid campaign comes after the Guesthouse Wind Villa in Kyoto revealed on Thursday that it had been “suddenly suspended” by Booking.com “without any prior inquiry, just three days after receiving a letter from the Israeli ambassador”.
The guesthouse had previously asked an Israeli guest, a former combat medic in the navy reserves, to sign a declaration confirming he had not participated in war crimes during his military service in Gaza.
Gilad Cohen, Israel’s ambassador in Japan, wrote in a letter to the governor of Kyoto that: “This discriminatory act, based solely on nationality, caused the guest significant emotional distress.”
“We trust that you will take the necessary steps to help ensure that such cases do not occur again and that Kyoto remains a welcoming destination for all visitors,” the letter stated.
Replying to Cohen in an open letter, the Wind Villa pointed out that it had asked guests from other countries to sign the declaration and that it was a requirement of all guests identified as “potentially having been involved in war crimes”.
Now, Booking.com has removed the Kyoto guesthouse from its platform, telling the owners that, “We have detected that you were discriminatory towards guests”.
However, according to Wind Villa, the Israeli guest did not use Booking.com to make his reservation.
