Airbnb has reversed its decision to remove rental listings of properties in Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian territory.
The home rental company announced on Tuesday it will back off a plan to remove Jewish settler homes in West Bank, which the UN has declared to be illegal under international law, to end lawsuits brought by hosts.
In November, Airbnb sparked outrage when it said it was removing around 200 homes 'that are at the core of the dispute between Israelis and Palestinians'.
Israeli lawyers immediately filed a class action suit against the San Francisco-based firm.
Airbnb’s announcement came after it was forced to settle in four lawsuits filed against it in the US and Israel.
A company statement said Airbnb will allow listings throughout the entire West Bank but will donate all profits from its business in the region.
Airbnb added that it will implement the same approach for listings in Moscow-backed separatist regions South Ossetia and Abkhazia, two other disputed areas where the company previously planned to take action.
The class action suit had sought 15,000 shekels ($4,183) in damages for the lead plaintiff and each other settler host should Airbnb delete them from its listings, a spokesman said earlier.
The decision would have affected around 200 homes in Israeli settlements that had been listed on the platform.
Around 400,000 Israelis live in settlements that dot the West Bank and range in size from tiny hamlets to large towns, in addition to 200,000 living in settlements in annexed East Jerusalem.
The settlements are illegal to the international community and are viewed as a barrier to peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
A major campaigner against Airbnb's earlier said 'Airbnb has realized what we have long argued - that boycotts of Jews anywhere, even just in the West Bank, are discriminatory.
'This is a huge blow to efforts to delegitimize the Jewish presence in the West Bank,' said Eugene Kontorovich, Director of International Law at the Jerusalem-based Kohelet Policy Forum.
But Arvind Ganesan, of New York-based Human Rights Watch, called Airbnb's retreat from the decision disappointing.
