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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 7, 2018)
4A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, DECEMBER 7, 2018 editor@dailyastorian.com KARI BORGEN Publisher JIM VAN NOSTRAND Editor Founded in 1873 JEREMY FELDMAN Circulation Manager DEBRA BLOOM Business Manager JOHN D. BRUIJN Production Manager CARL EARL Systems Manager PRO-CON Is Airbnb wrong to bar Israelis from using its room rental services? AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov Moshe Gordon sits outside his guest house advertised in 2016 on the Airbnb international home-sharing site, in the Nofei Prat settlement in the West Bank. Israel’s tourism minister, Yariv Levin, recently threatened Airbnb with higher taxes, restrictions and legal repercussions over its decision to remove listings from Israeli settlements. PRO: Airbnb unfairly sides with Palestinians in the West Bank W ASHINGTON — “We are most the Palestinian Authority runs it. certainly not the experts when it The successor to Yasser Arafat’s comes to the historical disputes in Palestinian Liberation Organization, the PA this region,” Airbnb stated in announcing that is headed by President Mahmoud Abbas, it would no longer list rentals by Israeli citi- who was elected to a four-year term in 2005 zens in the West Bank. Airbnb’s modesty is and has prevented elections to his office ever commendable, but its ignorance is insidious. since. Its policy for the West Bank subjects Though the PA routinely abuses the Israel to a singular global standard and human rights of Palestinians, Airbnb has reflects an all-too-common narrative about nothing to say. the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. By empow- Nor — while blaming the conflict on ering one-sided Israel-haters, it also makes Israeli settlement policy — does it seem to peace less likely, not more. care that, under Palestinian law, a Palestinian The West Bank is obviously disputed can face the death penalty for selling real territory, but Airbnb sees the dispute only estate to a Jew or that two Palestinians were through Palestinian eyes. sentenced last month to 15 years of After all, it isn’t leaving the West hard labor for doing so. Bank. If you want a place to rent Second, Airbnb has business in there, you can use Airbnb to find some of the world’s worst human one that’s owned by a Christian or rights-abusing countries. a Muslim. You just can’t find any In its 2018 “Freedom in the of the 200 or so owned by an Israeli World” report, Freedom House lists LAWRENCE 88 countries as “free” — that is Jew. J. HAAS Airbnb concluded that “Israeli based on their political rights and settlements in the occupied West civil liberties. Bank” are “at the core of the dispute between Fifty-eight nations are considered “partly Israelis and Palestinians.” free” and 49 as “not free.” Airbnb conducts So, Airbnb believes, what’s not “at the business in more than 190 countries so, by core of the dispute” is the rejection of Israel’s definition, it offers rentals in some of the right to exist that’s broadly shared among world’s most abusive places. Palestinians and their leaders; or the incite- Want to work for Airbnb? Check out its ment to violence against Jews on Palestinian office in Beijing, the capital of China, where TV and social media; or textbooks that teach Xi Jinping is brutally “re-educating” Uighur Palestinian school children that a future Muslims in concentration camps. Palestine should encompass all of what’s Want a rental in one of Airbnb’s busier now Israel; or Palestinian claims that Jews cities? Try Istanbul, showcase city of Turkey, have no historical ties to key religious sites in where Recep Erdogan jails opponents and Jerusalem. journalists under an increasingly autocratic Interesting. So, too, is Airbnb’s apparent rule. ignorance that Palestinians have rejected What’s Airbnb’s real motive? numerous offers of a state, including Israeli Well, the company announced its policy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s offer of 2008 a day before Human Rights Watch was that would have given the Palestinians about to report on its West Bank listings. It also 97 percent of the West Bank and divided was reportedly on a blacklist of companies Jerusalem between the two sides. operating in Israeli settlements that the U.N. Airbnb isn’t offended by territorial Human Rights Council plans to issue. disputes per se. It operates in such disputed So, to protect its brand, Airbnb is impos- ing a singular and wholly baseless standard lands as the Western Sahara, Northern on Israeli settlements in the West Bank. How Cyprus, Kashmir and Tibet. Nor is it concerned about the issue that inspiring! lies behind such disputes, which is the human Lawrence J. Haas, former communica- tions director for Vice President Al Gore, is rights of those involved. That’s true for two a senior fellow at the American Foreign Pol- reasons: First, while Israel occupies the West Bank, icy Council. CON: Airbnb has no choice but to comply with international law C OLUMBUS, Ohio — Airbnb, the under the control of a belligerent occupant company that connects travelers with does not thereby become its sovereign temporary housing, has announced territory.” That is the consistent view internationally. that it will no longer list housing in Israeli In 2004, the International Court of Justice settlements in the Palestinian West Bank. In a press statement, Airbnb explained that said the settlements are illegal. In 2016 the United Nations Security it had studied carefully the status of the West Bank, which is territory of Palestine occupied Council said they are “a flagrant violation under international law and a major obstacle” by Israel. “We concluded,” states the company, “that to peace. U.S. companies like Airbnb that operate we should remove listings in Israeli settle- ments in the occupied West Bank that are at internationally are sensitive to being on the the core of the dispute between Israelis and wrong side of the law. Palestinians.” The settlements would not be so harmful Airbnb had 200 listings of available tem- if they were small. But over three quarters of porary housing in the West Bank. a million Israelis have been settled. The company’s concern that it They take up territory that Palestine was taking a side in a dispute of needs to be viable as a state. international significance is based on That is why, as Airbnb says, the a longstanding view of the United settlements are central to the overall States and other countries. Palestinian-Israeli dispute. A commission appointed to study As a violation of laws of warfare, JOHN B. the matter and chaired by former U.S. the establishment of settlements in Sen. George Mitchell, D-Maine, con- QUIGLEY occupied territory is not only illegal cluded in 2001 that “the freezing of for governments, it is a crime for Israeli settlement activity” was necessary if individual persons. there was to be a hope of a negotiated Israel- The treaty establishing the International Palestine peace. The settlements, moreover, Criminal Court at the Hague lists acts that constitute war crimes. The act of transferring are considered illegal by the international civilians into occupied territory is on the list. community. The International Criminal Court’s prose- The Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 cutor in fact is currently collecting evidence forbids a state that takes territory in warfare with a view to leveling indictments against to plant its own people there. Israel took the persons, presumably Israeli officials, for the West Bank in warfare in 1967. West Bank settlements. At that time, Israel’s government con- At the Hague court, criminal liability falls sulted its own legal adviser, Theodor Meron, not only on direct perpetrators of war crimes, to see whether it would be legal to set up but on accomplices as well. settlements in the West Bank. In a formal This meant that Airbnb executives were in opinion letter, Meron replied that civilian settlement “contravenes explicit provisions of jeopardy for being complicit with the Israeli officials who promote settlements. the Fourth Geneva Convention.” Airbnb, by listing settlement properties as Ignoring Meron, Israel helped thousands sites for housing, was benefiting financially of Israelis settle in the West Bank. and was helping Israel’s settlers financially, That posed a problem for the United thereby solidifying the settlements. Airbnb States, which gives Israel aid. Were we help- ing Israel do something illegal? understandably does not want its executives In 1978, members of Congress asked to have to worry about going to jail. the White House if the settlements were Israel has responded to Airbnb with legal. Herbert Hansell, legal adviser to the threats to hurt its business elsewhere. Israel would do better to take a hard look at its own Department of State, wrote back that “the behavior. establishment of the civilian settlements in John B. Quigley is a distinguished profes- those territories is inconsistent with interna- sor of law at Ohio State University’s Moritz tional law.” Hansell explained, “Territory coming College of Law.
