Google Terminates 28 Workers Over Sit-In Protest Against Israeli Cloud Contract
Google fires 28 employees following sit-in demonstrations against Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion cloud and AI contract with the Israeli government. The protests, which lead to nine arrests, escalate ongoing internal friction over the company's ties to the military.
Google fires 28 employees after they participate in prolonged sit-in protests at the company's Sunnyvale and New York offices. The demonstrators oppose Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion joint cloud computing contract between Google, Amazon, and the Israeli government that provides artificial intelligence and machine learning technology to the Israeli military. The contract reportedly includes strict stipulations that prevent the tech giants from boycotting or halting services to Israel.
The recent protests escalate years of internal unrest over the three-year-old deal, with employees entering buildings and even occupying the office of Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian. Participating software engineer Hasan Ibraheem states that Google is directly implicated in the suffering of Palestinian people by providing this cloud and AI infrastructure. He notes that workers attempt to voice concerns through petitions, but leadership consistently ignores these internal pleas.
Law enforcement arrests nine Google workers during the demonstrations, forcibly removing four individuals from the New York office and five from the Sunnyvale location. The escalating conflict in the Middle East fuels these workplace actions, as employees increasingly pressure corporations to sever ties with military entities. The terminations mark a significant and aggressive escalation in the ongoing clash between Google management and activist employees.