It’s Time To Address Businesses’ Complicity in Gaza War Crimes | Opinion

One year on from Hamas’ atrocious killings and hostage-taking and the start of Israel’s heinous war on Gaza, the scale of civilian suffering in the Occupied Palestinian Territories—and now in Lebanon—is intensifying. The onslaught by the Israel Defense Forces shows no sign of slowing, even months after the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) warning of plausible risk of genocide made headline news. In response, scrutiny is rightly intensifying on the issue of business complicity in crimes against humanity, as companies across sectors—from arms exporters to tech giants—continue to turn profits amid unfathomable violence against civilians.
We must be clear: These firms stand at a fork in the road.
Will they forgo war profiteering, abide by international business standards, and follow humanitarian and human rights law? Will they cease arms exports that each day facilitate indiscriminate killings? Will they end their role in creating a fog of disinformation and hate speech? Or will they continue to fuel crimes against humanity and war crimes with no real end in sight?
International law and standards provide a well-defined path to answering these questions. The process is straightforward and widely embraced around the world in corporations’ mission statements, at least. The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights tell us that in circumstances of conflict, companies and investors have the responsibility to undertake heightened human rights due diligence. In armed conflict, companies must redouble their efforts to identify and address their effects on civilians’ human rights to ensure they do not contribute to the drivers of conflict, nor to the triggers that intensify violence.
After the ICJ found “real and imminent risk” of irreparable harm to rights under the Genocide Convention, one expert legal opinion stated that “corporations and their managers could be held liable for the commission of acts of genocide…. International criminal law suggests that direct complicity requires intentional participation, but not necessarily an intention to do harm, only knowledge of foreseeable harmful effects.” Arms and tech exports are essential to the Israel Defense Forces’ continued operations, and therefore instrumental to the civilian death toll and violations of international humanitarian law in Gaza. These legal risks are stark. They give even those business leaders who have lost any moral compass reason to reconsider.
But for many of the companies and investors linked to human rights abuses, even the most basic cornerstones of responsible business action are missing.
Research conducted by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre has found these firms to be opaque and falling woefully short of their human rights responsibilities. Of the 104 tech companies the Resource Centre asked about the steps they are taking to avoid contributing to further harm in the region, only four bothered to respond. In August, the Resource Centre also asked 15 arms exporters and 21 of their investors for their heightened human rights due diligence plans—once again, a mere four companies responded, alongside only three investors which at least shared credible efforts, including the consideration of disinvestment.
These firms’ opacity in the face of human suffering and clear risk of violations of international law indicates an unacceptable sense of impunity.
And so, what next?
What if companies cannot conduct the requisite heightened human rights due diligence in the chaos of conflict, or can create no business model that would avoid their contribution to “foreseeable harmful effects” on civilians?
Here, there is no fork in the road. Consideration of disinvestment and responsible exit from the conflict are the only possible next steps to abide by international law and business standards.
As the death toll climbs in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Lebanon, a growing number of governments and investors appear to be reaching this conclusion. They are finding it increasingly difficult to turn a blind eye to the expanding scale of violence and the risk that these companies cannot provide sufficient assurance that they are not contributing to it.
KLP, Norway’s largest pension provider, has now excluded Caterpillar from its investment portfolio due to concerns the company may be contributing to abuse through its products’ use in demolishing Palestinian homes and infrastructure in the West Bank. In mid-October, the U.K. government sanctioned Amana, a construction company involved in the establishment of illegal settlements in the West Bank. Other governments should consider imitating these moves to ensure adherence to international law.
When it comes to arms companies, there is little room for uncertainty: UN experts have called for a full arms embargo and cease of sale and transfer of surveillance technologies and dual-use items, while the U.K. government recently suspended 30 arms export licenses to Israel due to a “clear risk” they may be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian law.
History, and future courts, will be the judge of the tech, arms, and other companies that have continued their involvement, and remained silent on, the measures they are taking to avoid being used by the military and propagandists killing civilians and worsening hate speech in Gaza and Lebanon.
But leadership is required now, on every front, by more responsible businesses and investors to speak out for collective responsibility and robust government action; by governments, to enforce their domestic laws and international human rights standards for business; and by courts, to hear early legal challenges on corporate complicity for war crimes for those executives who remain committed to profit in the face of atrocities, and apply penalties. The civilians across the region who face untold suffering and destruction need this action now.
Mary Robinson is former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and former President of Ireland. Phil Bloomer is Executive Director of the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre.
The views expressed in this article are the writers’ own.