{"id":30651,"date":"2023-12-17T12:31:40","date_gmt":"2023-12-17T20:31:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=30651"},"modified":"2023-12-17T12:31:41","modified_gmt":"2023-12-17T20:31:41","slug":"hundreds-gather-at-googles-san-francisco-office-to-protest-1-2-billion-contract-with-israel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2023\/12\/17\/hundreds-gather-at-googles-san-francisco-office-to-protest-1-2-billion-contract-with-israel\/","title":{"rendered":"Hundreds gather at Google\u2019s San Francisco office to protest $1.2 billion contract with Israel"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By\u00a0Stephen Council <\/a>Dec 15, 2023 (SFGate.com)_<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Protesters staged a demonstration and die-in against Google\u2019s relationship with Israel\u2019s government outside the company\u2019s offices at 1 Market St. in San Francisco on Dec. 14, 2023. They are asking Google to end a contract that they argue aids Israel\u2019s military action in Gaza.Douglas Zimmerman\/SFGATE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

More than 400 protesters gathered at Google<\/a>\u2019s San Francisco office on Thursday to demand the tech company cut ties with Israel\u2019s government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Occupying a block of Market Street, attendees chanted, held up Palestinian flags, waved signs and listened to speeches by Google workers. Activists from the Palestinian Youth Movement and Jewish Voice for Peace also spoke, advocating for an Israel-Hamas cease-fire<\/a> and an end to what they called Israel\u2019s \u201capartheid regime.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The focus of the protest was Google and Amazon\u2019s Project Nimbus<\/a>, a $1.2 billion contract with Israel, launched in 2021, that provides the country with local data centers and cloud computing services. At various points in the two-hour event, speakers led the crowd in chants accusing Google of complicity in a genocide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Protesters block Market Street while staging a demonstration and die-in against Google\u2019s relationship with Israel\u2019s government outside the company\u2019s offices at 1 Market St. in San Francisco on Dec. 14, 2023. Douglas Zimmerman\/SFGATE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

When Rami Abdelkarim, an organizer with the Palestinian Youth Movement, addressed the crowd, he followed his demand that Google \u201cEnd Project Nimbus\u201d with a plea for a cease-fire and right of return for Palestinian refugees. After his speech, he told SFGATE that he thinks it\u2019s \u201cshameful\u201d workers have to \u201ctake to the streets\u201d to push their own company not to work with the Israeli government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPeople think of Google as a search engine, or a Bay Area tech hub,\u201d Abdelkarim said. \u201cBut they\u2019re war profiteers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multiple speakers mentioned an article from The Intercept, which reported that\u00a0Nimbus delivered Israel the technology<\/a>\u00a0for \u201cfacial detection, automated image categorization, object tracking, and even sentiment analysis.\u201d Others referred to an\u00a0NPR<\/a>\u00a0investigation reporting that Israel says it is using artificial intelligence to identify targets in Gaza, though the news outlet did not link the practice to Google\u2019s technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Protesters listen to speakers during a demonstration and die-in against Google\u2019s relationship with the Israeli government outside the company\u2019s offices at 1 Market St. in San Francisco on Dec. 14, 2023. They are asking for Google to end a contract that they argue aids Israel\u2019s military action in Gaza.Douglas Zimmerman\/SFGATE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A few speakers also mentioned the death of Mai Ubeid, who interned in a Google accelerator program in 2020 and was recently killed by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza, the Guardian<\/a> reported. Since Hamas\u2019 attack killed about 1,200 Israelis on Oct. 7, Israel\u2019s siege and airstrikes have left more than 18,000 Palestinians dead, according to Gaza\u2019s Ministry of Health<\/a>. The United Nations estimates that 85% of the Gaza Strip\u2019s population has been displaced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For most of Thursday\u2019s protest, two dozen people lay wrapped in sheets \u2014 reading \u201cGenocide\u201d in Google\u2019s signature rainbow lettering \u2014 in a \u201cdie-in\u201d performance. At the end, they stood to raise up white kites, as a speaker read Refaat Alareer\u2019s<\/a> \u201cIf I must die<\/a>,\u201d written just over a month before the Palestinian poet was killed by an Israeli airstrike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The protest was interrupted twice: A passerby yelled an obscenity, and a counterprotester made their way to the middle of the crowd, yelling that the protest was a \u201chate rally,\u201d before being escorted out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A counterprotester raises a sign at a protest and die-in against Google\u2019s relationship with Israel\u2019s government outside the company\u2019s offices at 1 Market St. in San Francisco on Dec. 14, 2023.Douglas Zimmerman\/SFGATE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The ongoing conflict in Gaza has provoked broader interest in Project Nimbus and the Palestinian cause; the Los Angeles Times<\/a> reported that an October protest against the contract, also in San Francisco, brought about 30 protesters. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Google did not respond to SFGATE\u2019s specific questions about Thursday\u2019s protest or the state of Project Nimbus\u2019 data centers, but spokesperson Anna Kowalczyk delivered a written statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have been very clear that the Nimbus contract is for workloads running on our commercial platform by Israeli government ministries such as finance, healthcare, transportation, and education,\u201d she said. \u201cOur work is not directed at highly sensitive or classified military workloads relevant to weapons or intelligence services.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2022, a Google spokesperson told Wired that\u00a0Israel\u2019s military would have access to the technology<\/a>, and\u00a0The Times of Israel<\/a>\u00a0reported in 2021 that when Google and Amazon signed on to provide Israel with cloud services, the contracts barred the companies from blocking access to specific government entities. Israel\u2019s Finance Ministry said Project Nimbus would serve the country\u2019s \u201cdefense establishment,\u201d\u00a0Haertz<\/a>\u00a0reported in 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Protesters staged a demonstration and die-in against Google\u2019s relationship with Israel\u2019s government outside the company\u2019s offices at 1 Market St. in San Francisco on Dec. 14, 2023. Douglas Zimmerman\/SFGATE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The reported scope of the contract is part of what rankles Google workers like Valerie Kuan, who helped organize the protest and spoke with SFGATE via email on Wednesday and at the event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe wish for Google to stop aiding Israel’s military in any form, especially advanced AI capabilities, as long as they are consistently violating the human rights of Palestinians and their Arab neighbors,\u201d the software engineer wrote. \u201cThis contract denies Google the right to withhold any provisioned services to the military, and thus, the entire contract with Israel must be stopped.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kuan also contested a point from Kowalczyk, who said in Google\u2019s statement that the protest was organized by \u201corganizations and people who largely don\u2019t work at Google.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGoogle and Amazon workers are and have always been the main organizers fighting against Project Nimbus,\u201d Kuan wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Protesters staged a demonstration and die-in against Google\u2019s relationship with Israel\u2019s government outside the company\u2019s offices at 1 Market St. in San Francisco on Dec. 14, 2023. Douglas Zimmerman\/SFGATE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhile we have been able to capture much of our community to rally around the No Tech for Apartheid campaign, it is our responsibility as employees to lead the efforts,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hear of anything happening at Google or another tech company? Contact tech reporter Stephen Council securely at stephen.council@sfgate.com or on Signal at 628-204-5452.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dec 15, 2023<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By\u00a0Stephen Council<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stephen Council is the tech reporter at SFGATE. He has covered technology and business for The Information, The Wall Street Journal, CNBC and CalMatters, where his reporting won a San Francisco Press Club award. Signal: 628-204-5452 Email: stephen.council@sfgate.com<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Stephen Council Dec 15, 2023 (SFGate.com)_ More than 400 protesters gathered at Google\u2019s San Francisco office on Thursday to demand the tech company cut ties with Israel\u2019s government. Occupying a block of Market Street, attendees chanted, held up Palestinian flags, waved signs and listened to speeches by Google workers. Activists from… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[583,828,21],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30651"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30651"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30651\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30665,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30651\/revisions\/30665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}