Google fires 28 employees over protest of cloud contract with Israel
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Google fired 28 employees on Wednesday after sit-ins at the company's offices in protest of its cloud computing contract with the Israeli government.
Why it matters: The protests stemmed from long-brewing discontent among a group of Google and Amazon workers over claims that Israel is using the companies' services to harm Palestinians.
Context: The group of workers, called No Tech For Apartheid, organized sit-in demonstrations earlier this week at Google locations in New York City, Seattle and Sunnyvale, California to protest Project Nimbus.
Nimbus, which went into effect in July 2021, is a $1.2 billion artificial intelligence and computing services agreement between Google, Amazon Web Services and the Israeli government.
What they're saying: Google said in a statement Thursday that the Nimbus contract "is not directed at highly sensitive, classified, or military workloads relevant to weapons or intelligence services."
