UN lists 150 firms tied to illegal Israeli settlements

Report exposes planetary firms profiting from Israel’s unlawful colony endeavor successful the occupied West Bank.

The United Nations has released a report, revealing that much than 150 companies, including Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia and TripAdvisor, are profiting from Israel’s amerciable colony endeavor successful the occupied West Bank.

The UN quality rights bureau connected Friday updated its database, listing 158 firms operating wrong settlements deemed unlawful by the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

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While astir of the companies are Israeli, the database besides includes multinationals registered successful the United States, Canada, China, France, and Germany.

The study emphasised that businesses person a work to debar fuelling abuses.

“Where concern enterprises place that they person caused oregon contributed to adverse quality rights impacts, they should supply for oregon cooperate successful remediation done due processes,” it said.

The update added 68 companies since the past work successful June 2023, and it removed 7 firms, including British-registered online question institution Opodo and Spanish-domiciled online question cause eDreams.

The bulk of the different firms were tied to construction, existent estate, mining, and quarrying sectors that are cardinal to Israel’s colony enlargement efforts. More than 300 further firms stay nether review.

UN quality rights main Volker Turk said the findings item firm work successful struggle zones.

“This study underscores the owed diligence work of businesses moving successful contexts of struggle to guarantee their activities bash not lend to quality rights abuses,” helium said.

Israeli strategy to displace Palestinians

The reappraisal comes amid heightened scrutiny of Israel’s concern and ongoing apartheid successful the West Bank and the ongoing genocide it has been committing successful Gaza since October 2023.

In the West Bank, equipped Jewish settlers, emboldened by authorities backing, person terrorised Palestinian communities, sidesplitting civilians, displacing families, and grabbing onshore successful what quality rights groups picture arsenic ethnic cleansing.

Settlements person been expanding relentlessly since Israel seized the West Bank successful the 1967 war, carving up the territory with roads, walls, and checkpoints that support Palestinians confined and nether subject rule.

A abstracted UN Commission of Inquiry this week accused Israel of pursuing a deliberate strategy to forcibly displace Palestinians, entrench Jewish-only settlements, and determination towards afloat annexation of the West Bank.

Civil nine groups accidental the database, mandated by the Human Rights Council successful 2016, provides a captious instrumentality to unit companies to retreat from settlements. Rights advocates reason that planetary firms helping Israel entrench its concern are complicit successful violations of planetary law.

Both Israel and the United States person agelong attacked the UN for what they assertion is unfair attraction to Israel’s policies successful the occupied Palestinian territory, but for Palestinians, the caller database is different reminder of the machinery sustaining a decades-long occupation.