Ex Google Staff Fired Over Israel Protest File NLRB Complaint

Staff who were dismissed after protesting a cloud contract with Israel, and demonstrated “completely unacceptable behaviour”, have filed a complaint against their termination.

Reuters reported that former Google staff have filed a complaint with the US National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), and alleged the tech giant unlawfully fired about 50 employees for protesting its cloud contract with the Israeli government.

Last month Google had terminated 28 employees, after a series of protests against labour conditions and the company’s contract to provide the Israeli government with cloud computing and artificial intelligence services.

Israel protest

According to Google a small number of employees affiliated with the ‘No Tech for Apartheid’ campaign had entered and disrupted work at two office locations in New York and Sunnyvale, California.

Nine Google workers were arrested on trespassing charges after staging a sit-in at the company’s offices.

The New York sit in lasted over nine hours and spanned two floors.

Some staff even reportedly entered and staged a protest in the office of Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian.

Google alleged that the protesters had defaced its property during the protest, and even physically impeded the work of other Googlers.

However the protesters denied Google’s accusations and said the firings were an “excuse to avoid confronting us and our concerns directly, and attempt to justify its illegal, retaliatory firings, is a lie.”

Last week another 20 staff were fired by Google over the matter, bringing the total number of terminated staff to more than 50, according to the group representing the workers.

NLRB complaint

Now the fired workers have reportedly filed a complaint late Monday with the US National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), alleging that by firing the workers, Google interfered with their rights under US labor law to advocate for better working conditions.

Zelda Montes, a former Google employee who was arrested during a protest of Project Nimbus, said Google fired workers to suppress organising and send a message to its workforce that dissent would not be tolerated.

“Google is attempting to instill fear in employees,” Montes reportedly said in a statement provided by No Tech For Apartheid.

The workers in the NLRB complaint are reportedly seeking to be reinstated to their jobs with back pay and a statement from Google that it will not violate workers’ rights to organise.

The NLRB general counsel will reportedly review complaints and attempt to settle claims it finds to have merit.