Over 40 US grassroots organizations have demanded Amazon and Google to revoke a contract they signed a few months ago with the Israeli military and security establishments.
The organizations said they launched the “No Tech For Apartheid” campaign responding to an open letter from over 500 Amazon and Google employees published recently in The Guardian calling on their employers to cancel their contract with the Israeli military known as “Project Nimbus” and to refuse all contracts that contribute to Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people.
“As Israeli bombs leveled entire residential buildings in Gaza this past May Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud executives put pen to paper to secure Project Nimbus: a lucrative $1.22 billion dollar contract with the Israeli government to build cloud infrastructure for the country’s military and government ministries” according to a press release issued by the organizations.
These organizations include MPower Change and Jewish Voice for Peace. Select quotes from their leaders are below.
“When executives at tech companies put profit over people by signing billion dollar contracts with apartheid governments it’s our responsibility to fight back. Building a better world means none of us can be free until Palestinians are free. By putting pen to paper and signing on the dotted line Amazon and Google executives chose to streamline apartheid and enable the surveillance criminalization and destruction of Palestinian lives” Lau Barrios campaign manager at MPower Change said.
“We say enough. That’s why we’re rising up alongside workers at both companies to demand that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy and Google CEO Sundar Pichai choose to be on the right side of history instead of the side of colonialism ethnic cleansing and human suffering. From the US to Palestine we say no more tech for state violence. No Tech For Apartheid” Barrios added.
“Courageous workers at Google and Amazon are calling on their employers to stop enabling the Israeli government’s oppression of Palestinian families – and we are proud to stand with them. Google and Amazon cloud services can be used by the Israeli military to suppress Palestinians through surveillance and to expand the theft of Palestinian land. Google and Amazon executives should listen to their employees pull out of the Nimbus contract and cut all ties with the Israeli military” Stefanie Fox executive director at Jewish Voice for Peace said.
