One of the world’s most visited travel platforms is letting tourists book stays in Israeli settlements built on occupied Palestinian land. A damning new report by US advocacy group Eko puts Booking.com at the center of a growing human rights controversy, just days before its parent company faces a critical shareholder vote.
What Booking.com Is Actually Listing
The Eko report, titled “Booking.com: experience Israel’s illegal occupation,” found 41 active properties across 14 illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, generating revenue for both the company and the settlement economy.
The offers range from hotels and flats to bed and breakfasts, glamping sites and Bedouin tents. Nothing about these listings is modest.
Some properties were advertised at nightly rates exceeding $7,000, with listings spanning from low-cost rooms to luxury villas.
Here is what the numbers actually look like:
- 41 active Booking.com listings found in occupied territories
- 14 Israeli settlements covered across the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem
- At least 3,800 customer reviews collected on those listings
- Some nightly rates advertised above $7,000
- Listings concentrated around areas near East Jerusalem and the Dead Sea
Booking.com describes these as “good” and even “excellent” locations. What it does not say is that the settlements are illegal under international law.
Eko argued that by offering these properties to international travelers without clear disclosure, Booking.com is actively normalizing and financially supporting an enterprise that much of the world considers a serious violation of human rights.
A Palestinian Family’s Land Is Now a Hotel Listing
The Eko report went beyond counting listings. It traced one specific property directly to stolen Palestinian land.
Researchers used geographic analysis tools and archived land records from the Palestinian town of al-Khader near Bethlehem to trace one property listed on Booking.com in the Israeli settlement of Neve Daniel to land registered to the Palestinian Sbeih family.
The property is marketed to tourists under the name “Mountain View.” No mention of whose land it sits on.
Mohammed Sbeih, the grandson of the original registered landowners, has been unable to access the land for years after it was confiscated.
The Sbeih family’s story is not a unique one. Across the occupied West Bank, Palestinian landowners have watched their farms and fields get seized, converted into settlement properties, and now listed on global platforms for international tourists, while those same Palestinian families cannot even get past a military checkpoint to set foot on their ancestral land.
Settler Violence and the Listings That Stay Up
The Eko report draws a direct line between Booking.com’s listings and the violence Palestinian communities live with every day.
Citing data from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the report said settlers carried out 1,828 attacks against Palestinians during 2025, averaging around five attacks per day.
The report referenced a March 2026 attack on the Palestinian village of Khirbet Humsa, located near the settlement of Hamdat, where Eko said Booking.com continued to advertise accommodation.
“Our livestock is stolen, children are targeted and our families are attacked at night,” said Qusai Abu al-Kabash, a resident quoted in the report. “We want Booking.com to stop allowing tourists from around the world to spend their holidays in these settlements.”
A UN Human Rights Office report from March 2026 confirmed that Israel had forcibly displaced over 36,000 Palestinians amid accelerating settlement expansion, and documented 1,732 incidents of settler violence in just the preceding 12-month reporting period.
According to that report, “settler violence continued in a coordinated, strategic and largely unchallenged manner.” Booking.com’s listings sit inside this same landscape.
Courts, Pension Funds, and a Board That Pushes Back
The legal and corporate pressure on Booking.com has been building for years. It has now reached a breaking point.
| Type of Pressure | Details |
|---|---|
| UN Human Rights Database | Named alongside Airbnb, Expedia and TripAdvisor as among 158 firms operating in settlements ruled unlawful by the ICJ |
| Criminal Complaint (Netherlands, 2023) | Filed accusing Booking.com of money laundering linked to revenues from settlement properties |
| Dutch Pension Funds | Several Dutch pension funds reportedly divested from the company |
| Netherlands Government Position | The Netherlands, where Booking.com is registered, considers Israeli settlements in occupied territory as contrary to international law |
| Shareholder Resolution (2026) | Called on the company to provide greater transparency regarding human rights risks connected to settlement operations |
Booking.com states that it “wholeheartedly disagrees” with allegations of illegal activity and claims there are no laws prohibiting listings in Israeli settlements.
The company’s standard position is that it “permits all accommodation providers worldwide to list on our platform as long as they comply with applicable local laws,” and that it includes additional information when a region “may pose greater risks to travellers.”
The company’s board has urged shareholders to reject the resolution, describing the settlement-related business as “financially insignificant” and dismissing the allegations as “broad and unsubstantiated.”
Booking.com charges an average 15 percent commission per reservation worldwide. Rights groups say that even a small number of bookings from occupied settlement properties makes the company a direct financial beneficiary of an occupation the International Court of Justice has repeatedly ruled must end.
Booking.com has not publicly responded to the latest Eko report. Its annual general meeting is scheduled for June 2, 2026. The shareholder vote on the settlement resolution will be one of the most watched moments of that meeting.
For the Sbeih family and thousands of Palestinian families like them, this debate is not about corporate governance or shareholder resolutions. It is about land that was farmed by grandparents, seized without consent, and now listed under a five-star review on one of the world’s most used travel websites, with no warning, no disclosure, and no acknowledgment that it was ever anyone else’s home. As the June 2 vote approaches, the world is asking a simple question: when a travel platform profits from occupied land, who is truly responsible? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
