Fired Google Workers Who Protested Israel Deal File Complaint With Labor Board
The fired workers said they weren’t debating politics, but discussing their working conditions, which include building software that is sold to governments including Israel’s.
April 30, 2024
![Google headquarters in Mountain View, Ca. Google headquarters in Mountain View, Ca.](https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/blt8eb3cdfc1fce5194/blte659c73687c24c8b/6621107d179a0c814295d004/393017105_20(1).jpg?width=850&auto=webp&quality=95&format=jpg&disable=upscale)
SAN FRANCISCO - The terminated Google workers who staged protests at two company offices earlier this month over the company’s contract with Israel have filed a formal complaint alleging the company violated their labor rights by firing them.
The charge was filed with the National Labor Relations Board, an independent federal agency that protects the rights of private sector employees, on Monday evening, according to a spokesperson for No Tech for Apartheid, the group that organized the protests.
Google didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The action comes as university campuses have erupted with student occupations in protest of Israel’s war against Palestinians, a sentiment that could tip over into corporate America, especially among the younger generation of workers.
Since the beginning of the conflict in Israel in October, tech workers have been escalating a years-long push to get their employers, Google and Amazon, to cancel a contract dubbed Project Nimbus, which is a cloud computing deal with various branches of the Israeli government, including the Israel Defense Forces. The workers involved have repeatedly said the project makes the companies complicit in what they say is Palestinian genocide.
Earlier this month, Google workers in New York and Sunnyvale, Calif., held sit-ins on two Google campuses. Nine participants were arrested after they refused to leave, and 50 employees so far have been fired, participants said.
The day after the firings began, Google CEO Sundar Pichai sent out an email to staff saying that work is not a place to “fight over disruptive issues or debate politics.”
But the fired workers said they weren’t debating politics, but discussing their working conditions, which include building software that is sold to governments including Israel’s.