{"id":8390,"date":"2026-04-13T16:34:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T14:34:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/?p=8390"},"modified":"2026-04-13T16:36:01","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T14:36:01","slug":"booking-com-war-crimes-complaint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/booking-com-war-crimes-complaint\/","title":{"rendered":"Coalition Challenges\u00a0Prosecutor\u2019s\u00a0Prolonged Failure to Act on Booking.com Complaint Before Dutch Court of Appeal\u00a0\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

On 9 April 2026, our\u00a0coalition\u00a0of ten Palestinian and Dutch organisations filed a complaint with the Dutch Court of Appeal challenging the prolonged failure of the Dutch Public Prosecutor to reach a decision on our criminal complaint against Booking.com\u00a0for profiting from the commission of war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territory (OPT).\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through\u00a0an\u00a0\u2018Article 12\u00a0procedure\u2019, we are asking the Court to assess the merits of the complaint and decide whether the prosecutor must\u00a0proceed\u00a0with a criminal\u00a0investigation.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The original criminal complaint<\/a>, filed on 8 November 2023, accuses Booking.com of laundering profits generated through listings in Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, including\u00a0East\u00a0Jerusalem. These settlements are part of Israel\u2019s unlawful settlement enterprise,\u00a0established\u00a0and maintained through war crimes, including the transfer of Israel\u2019s population into occupied Palestinian territory.\u00a0By\u00a0providing\u00a0reservation services for\u00a0hotels\u00a0and\u00a0holiday\u00a0rental\u00a0properties in those settlements and channelling the resulting profits through the Dutch financial system, Booking.com is profiting from war crimes in violation of Dutch anti-money laundering legislation.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under Dutch criminal procedure, there is no specific time limit for the\u00a0Prosecutor to take a decision on this matter. That means they could\u00a0delay\u00a0the \u2018preliminary investigation stage\u2019\u00a0indefinitely,\u00a0effectively\u00a0shielding Booking.com\u00a0from\u00a0accountability. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cases involving war crimes deserve rigorous legal scrutiny. We have acted accordingly: we allowed time for the preliminary examination to\u00a0take place\u00a0and made two further filings to support that process with\u00a0additional\u00a0evidence and legal arguments.\u00a0\u00a0After\u00a0two and a half\u00a0years,\u00a0we can no longer accept this\u00a0unconscionable\u00a0delay\u00a0under the\u00a0guise\u00a0of \u2018careful review\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the\u00a0Prosecutor\u00a0has sat on this\u00a0complaint, settlement expansion, forced displacement, and settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank have all continued to intensify.\u00a0Research<\/a>\u00a0by the organisations involved in this case also shows that, in the first year after the complaint was filed, Booking.com sharply increased its listings in illegal settlements in\u00a0East\u00a0Jerusalem. In other words, while the Dutch authorities have failed to\u00a0properly\u00a0investigate\u00a0our complaint, the business model at the heart of the complaint has continued.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\u00a0Prosecutor\u2019s inaction\u00a0is\u00a0unconscionable. The issue here is not simply administrative slowness.\u00a0This\u00a0continued failure to act on a complaint concerning corporate profits derived from an unlawful settlement economy built on dispossession, annexation, and war crimes,\u00a0sends a worrying signal to corporations\u00a0–\u00a0that\u00a0they can\u00a0continue\u00a0to\u00a0aid and abet such crimes with\u00a0complete\u00a0impunity.\u00a0\u00a0
While the\u00a0Prosecutor\u00a0remained inactive, Palestinians continued to face forced displacement and violence, settlements continued to grow, and Booking.com continued to derive profit from that unlawful reality. This investigation cannot remain frozen while the underlying crimes\u00a0escalate,\u00a0and\u00a0their economic beneficiaries\u00a0continue profiting.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This appeal is about more than Booking.com alone. It is also about whether the Dutch legal system will treat corporate\u00a0complicity\u00a0in war crimes with the seriousness such cases demand. When prosecutors allow a complaint of this\u00a0magnitude\u00a0to stagnate, despite escalating harm and growing evidence, they undermine confidence in the\u00a0rule of law\u00a0itself.\u00a0It is crucial that the Prosecutor takes immediate action to\u00a0enforce the law and\u00a0hold Booking.com accountable for laundering the proceeds of serious international crimes being committed\u00a0in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Willem\u00a0Jebbink, the criminal lawyer who filed the complaint on behalf of the coalition,\u00a0stated:\u00a0
\u201cWhile cases involving war crimes are\u00a0generally complex, we believe that this\u00a0particular case\u00a0\u2014 concerning the profiting from war crimes \u2014 is comparatively straightforward to prove. I have never seen the Public Prosecution Service take approximately two and a half years to investigate a complaint without reaching any conclusion. My clients consider a criminal investigation to be urgently necessary, as war crimes continue to be committed in the West Bank<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The Court of Appeal now\u00a0has the opportunity to\u00a0act.\u00a0The Court\u00a0must\u00a0direct the\u00a0Dutch Public\u00a0Prosecutor to move forward with the prosecution of Booking.com\u00a0as a matter of the utmost urgency\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Legal battles cost money.\u00a0Help us<\/a>\u00a0hold Booking.com accountable \u2014 contribute to this fight against a company that profits from occupation.\u00a0<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On 9 April 2026, a coalition of Palestinian and Dutch organisations filed a complaint with the Dutch Court of Appeal over the Prosecutor\u2019s prolonged failure to act on a criminal case against Booking.com. The case concerns alleged profits derived from listings in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory. After more than two years of inaction, the coalition is calling for judicial review and accountability.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":8392,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,1],"tags":[140],"test-2":[],"country":[115],"blog_categories":[],"class_list":["post-8390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-case-update","category-uncategorized","tag-accountability","country-nl"],"acf":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":3,"label":"Case Update"},{"value":1,"label":"Media Coverage"}],"post_tag":[{"value":140,"label":"Accountability"}],"country":[{"value":115,"label":"The Netherlands"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/elsc.support\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Booking.com-2-1024x576.png",1024,576,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Bashar","author_link":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/author\/bashar\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":3,"name":"Case Update","slug":"case-update","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":3,"taxonomy":"category","description":"Updates on legal cases ELSC is working on.","parent":0,"count":33,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":3,"category_count":33,"category_description":"Updates on legal cases ELSC is working on.","cat_name":"Case Update","category_nicename":"case-update","category_parent":0},{"term_id":1,"name":"Media Coverage","slug":"uncategorized","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1,"taxonomy":"category","description":"Mentions or features of ELSC in external media.","parent":0,"count":16,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":1,"category_count":16,"category_description":"Mentions or features of ELSC in external media.","cat_name":"Media Coverage","category_nicename":"uncategorized","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":[{"term_id":140,"name":"Accountability","slug":"accountability","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":140,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"Legal and institutional accountability","parent":0,"count":26,"filter":"raw"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8390"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8390\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8396,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8390\/revisions\/8396"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8390"},{"taxonomy":"test-2","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/test-2?post=8390"},{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=8390"},{"taxonomy":"blog_categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsc.support\/da\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/blog_categories?post=8390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}