Google backed Israel’s military. Now its workers are in revolt

In the early hours of the morning, Zelda Montes makes their way through the cold streets of New York, heading toward Google’s headquarters on Manhattan’s 9th Avenue. Montes, who uses they/them pronouns, merges seamlessly with the crowd of Google employees swiping through the building’s security, making it seem like just another regular day.

Carrying an oversized tote bag, Montes tucks back their purple hair and heads to the 13th-floor canteen, ordering their usual: a dirty chai and an egg, avocado, and cheese sandwich with a side of fresh raspberries. But their hands shake slightly as they grip the coffee cup, a sign of the tension brewing beneath the surface.

Once they receive a nod from two colleagues, they head to the building’s entrance and take their seats. Together, the three unfurl banners and begin to chant a demand that echoes through the hallways: Google must drop Project Nimbus.

For Montes, this moment marks the end of their time as a “Googler”—the company’s own term for its employees. “Getting fired felt like a possibility but never a reality,” they reflect, following the company’s decision to terminate the employment of 50 workers after a 10-hour sit-in at one of Google’s American offices last April.

For three years, Montes has been one of several employees urging Google to end Project Nimbus, a controversial partnership worth approximately $1.2 billion between Google, Amazon, and the Israeli government. The agreement provides cloud computing services to various Israeli governmental bodies, including the defense ministry and the military.

Despite repeated requests for comment, Google did not respond to inquiries from Middle East Eye (MEE) before this story was published. However, in previous statements, Google has asserted that Project Nimbus is not intended for “highly sensitive, classified, or military workloads” related to weapons or intelligence activities. Yet, many Google employees—both current and former—have been secretly working to organize opposition to the company’s involvement in the project.

The calls for Google to drop Project Nimbus have grown louder, especially after Israel’s assault on Gaza, which followed Hamas’ October 7 attacks in southern Israel. This ongoing conflict has claimed the lives of over 41,000 Palestinians in the besieged enclave. Many Google employees fear that their work, particularly related to artificial intelligence, is being used to support actions that amount to what they view as a genocide against Palestinians.

Employees who have spoken out describe a harsh response from Google, which they say dismisses claims about its involvement in Israel’s brutal military operations in Gaza and the illegal occupation of the West Bank, as declared by the International Court of Justice. These mass firings have exposed deep divisions within Google’s workforce, with some employees risking their jobs to stand against the company’s stance on the conflict.

MEE interviewed Google employees from the US and Europe, many of whom chose to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation. They detailed the difficulties of organizing internally, describing how their efforts were met with censorship, firings, and threats, creating a “hostile work environment.” Some have left the company, while others continue their activism quietly, rallying behind the group “No Tech for Apartheid,” which condemns the tech industry’s role in what they call Israel’s “ethnic cleansing of Gaza.”

Montes, who began as an intern and worked as a software engineer at Google for two years, joined other concerned colleagues in questioning Google’s ties to Israel. They initially used platforms like YouTube town halls to ask why Google was accepting money from the Israeli government to run propaganda advertisements after the October 7 attacks, targeting the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which aids Palestinian refugees.

Yet, Google’s culture of openness seemed to stop when it came to Palestine. Montes and others found their questions about Project Nimbus repeatedly moderated out or ignored during internal meetings. Similar frustrations were voiced by staff in Google’s artificial intelligence division, DeepMind, who saw their concerns about the project being dismissed.

In an email to employees sent ten days after the October 7 attacks, Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced an $8 million donation to support relief efforts in both Israel and Gaza, condemning rising antisemitism and Islamophobia. But for many Googlers, the company’s selective acknowledgment of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza rang hollow. They recalled the company’s far more vocal support for Ukraine, highlighting a stark contrast in its responses to global conflicts.

The internal struggle over Project Nimbus has led many employees to shift their activism off Google’s premises, meeting in private to avoid surveillance. These gatherings aimed to plan further actions, including petitions and direct protests against Google’s ties to Israel’s military.

The tension reached a boiling point in late October 2023, when an Israeli airstrike killed Mai Ubeid, a Palestinian software engineer, and her entire family in Gaza. Ubeid, who had participated in a Google-funded coding boot camp, became a symbol of the conflict’s devastating human toll. Google employees held vigils in her memory outside offices in New York, Seattle, and London, facing hostility and even harassment from pro-Israel colleagues.

Montes, alongside other fired workers, remains undeterred, continuing to speak out against what they see as Google’s complicity in Israel’s actions in Gaza. They believe that Project Nimbus is part of a broader shift in Google’s strategy, positioning the company to secure more military contracts, despite the objections of a segment of its workforce.

This internal resistance, although marginalized by Google’s leadership, represents a significant ethical debate within the tech industry—highlighting the struggles of workers who are challenging their employer’s role in global conflicts, even when the price is their own job security.