Hundreds of students boycott graduate jobs at Google, Amazon over 'Israeli apartheid support'

Hundreds of students boycott graduate jobs at Google, Amazon over 'Israeli apartheid support'
More than 550 students have pledged to refuse jobs at Amazon and Google, after the tech giants signed a $1.22 billion agreement to provide cloud technology to the Israeli military.
2 min read
07 April, 2022
The 'No Tech for Apartheid' campaign called on "students of conscience" to refuse jobs at Google and Amazon [Getty]

More than 550 students have pledged to refuse graduate jobs or internships at Amazon and Google until the tech giants end their contracts with the Israeli government and military.

The student pledge was created by the 'No Tech for Apartheid' campaign which seeks to pressure companies to "stop profiting off of Israeli apartheid and violence against the Palestinian people".

The global campaign is run by Jewish Voice for Peace and MPower Change.

Amazon and Google signed a $1.22 billion agreement known as 'Project Nimbus' in May last year to provide cloud technology to the Israeli government and military.

This took place while Israel was engaged in a deadly assault on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip which killed over 250 people, according to a statement signed by anonymous employees at the two tech giants.

"Palestinians are already harmed by Israeli surveillance and violence. [By] providing their state of the art technology to the Israeli occupation’s government and military, Amazon and Google are helping to make Israeli apartheid more efficient, more violent, and even deadlier for Palestinians," the students' pledge reads.

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"Until Amazon and Google executives choose to be on the right side of history and cut the contract, we pledge not to take jobs or internships at Google or Amazon," it adds.

"Technology should be used to bring people together, not enable apartheid and ethnic cleansing".

The campaign called on "students of conscience" at universities worldwide to join Google and Amazon employees in protest of their contract with the Israeli military.

Last October, 90 Google and 300 Amazon employees of conscience spoke out against the deal in a statement published by The Guardian and demanded that their employers "cut all ties with the Israeli military".

"Our employers signed a contract called Project Nimbus to sell dangerous technology to the Israeli military and government... this technology allows for further surveillance of and unlawful data collection on Palestinians, and facilitates expansion of Israel’s illegal settlements on Palestinian land," the employees wrote.

Earlier this month, over 500 Google workers  also signed a petition supporting a Jewish colleague who claimed she was being pushed out of her role for protesting against Project Nimbus, accusing the Internet giant of "unjustly retaliating" against her for her pro-Palestine activism.