BHR database Pursuant to Human Rights Council resolution 31/36

Mandate

On 24 March 2016, the Human Rights Council adopted resolution 31/36, entitled “Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan”. The HRC is an intergovernmental body, made up of 47 Member States. Resolutions are voted on and adopted by these Member States.

Paragraph 17 of this resolution requests the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to produce a database of all business enterprises engaged in certain Israeli settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, in consultation with the Working Group on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises.

On 14 July 2023, the Human Rights Council adopted resolution 53/25, entitled “Implementation of the Human Rights Resolution 31/36”, requesting in its paragraph 1 that the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights pursue its work on the oPt database and present yearly updates to the Human Rights Council. 

Scope of the Database

As specified in resolution 31/36, the parameters of the business activities to be reflected in the database are defined by paragraph 96 of the report of the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission to investigate the implications of the Israeli settlements on the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of the Palestinian people throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem (A/HRC/22/63). 

Paragraph 96 of A/HRC/22/63 reads as follows:

96. Information gathered by the mission showed that business enterprises have, directly and indirectly, enabled, facilitated and profited from the construction and growth of the settlements. In addition to the previously mentioned violations of Palestinian worker rights, the mission identified a number of business activities and related issues that raise particular human rights violations concerns. They include:

• The supply of equipment and materials facilitating the construction and the expansion of settlements and the wall, and associated infrastructures;
• The supply of surveillance and identification equipment for settlements, the wall and checkpoints directly linked with settlements;
• The supply of equipment for the demolition of housing and property, the destruction of agricultural farms, greenhouses, olives groves and crops;
• The supply of security services, equipment and materials to enterprises operating in settlements;
• The provision of services and utilities supporting the maintenance and existence of settlements, including transport;
• Banking and financial operations helping to develop, expand or maintain settlements and their activities, including loans for housing and the development of businesses;
• The use of natural resources, in particular water and land, for business purposes;
• Pollution, and the dumping of waste in or its transfer to Palestinian villages;
• Captivity of the Palestinian financial and economic markets, as well as practices that disadvantage Palestinian enterprises, including through restrictions on movement, administrative and legal constraints;
• Use of benefits and reinvestments of enterprises owned totally or partially by settlers for developing, expanding and maintaining the settlements.

Reporting further to the mandate

2018: On 20 March 2018, OHCHR published an interim report (A/HRC/37/39), setting out methodology used to discharge the mandate.

2020: On 12 February 2020, OHCHR published a report (A/HRC/43/71) containing a database listing 112 business entities.

2023: On 30 June 2023, OHCHR published an update containing a review of the 112 business entities.

Call for input

Call for input on BHR oPt database
Deadline: 12 June 2024