UN lists 214 companies involved in Israeli settlement-related business activities

The UN Human Rights Office has identified 214 companies from 11 countries as involved in specified business activities linked to Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories, according to an updated database released on Monday.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said it added 61 companies to the database and removed five after determining that they had ceased the activities covered by its mandate.

The database, first published in 2020 under a mandate from the UN Human Rights Council, examines corporate involvement in a defined set of activities connected to Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory.

Companies included in the latest update operate across sectors including agriculture, transportation and storage, waste management, energy, food and hospitality.

OHCHR said it received information concerning 596 companies following a public call for submissions in 2024. It reviewed 215 of those companies last year and completed assessments of another 126 during the latest reporting period. Reviews of additional companies remain underway.

READ: Israeli occupiers establish new settlement outpost in occupied West Bank: Rights group

Because of resource constraints, the latest assessment focused specifically on the impact of settlement-related business activities on the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination, rather than evaluating their potential effects across the full range of human rights.

The UN office assessed corporate involvement using three categories drawn from the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: whether a company caused an adverse impact, contributed to it, or was directly linked to it through its operations, products, services or business relationships.

Of the 214 companies listed, OHCHR assessed 200 as contributing to adverse impacts on the Palestinian right to self-determination and 14 as directly linked to such impacts. It did not conclude that any of the companies had itself caused the adverse impact.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said the update served as a reminder of companies’ responsibilities under international standards, including the need to conduct human rights due diligence and take appropriate action when their activities contribute to or are linked with adverse impacts.

Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, are illegal under international law. 

READ: Settler Violence in the West Bank and the UK Settlement Import Ban