Google, Amazon urged to reject Israel's Project Nimbus

A group of anonymous Google and Amazon workers has called on the leaders of both companies "to pull out of Project Nimbus and cut all ties with the Israeli military", according to an open letter published in the British newspaper The Guardian.

Project Nimbus is an Israeli effort to build its own local cloud storage servers. 

"Our employers signed a contract called Project Nimbus to sell dangerous technology to the Israeli military and government," the letter said on Tuesday. 

"The technology our companies have contracted to build will make the systematic discrimination and displacement carried out by the Israeli military and government even crueler and deadlier for Palestinians."

Both Google and Amazon won the bid to set up and operate the "massive state tender" that sees an investment of more than $1.2 billion.

In the letter, the "employees of conscience," said they are from diverse backgrounds and they believe "technology we build should work to serve and uplift people everywhere, including all of our users. As workers who keep these companies running, we are morally obligated to speak out against violations of these core values."

The authors said more than 90 workers at Google and more than 300 at Amazon have signed this letter internally and they have opted to remain anonymous "because we fear retaliation."

The letter stated that Project Nimbus allows for "further surveillance of and unlawful data collection on Palestinians, and facilitates the expansion of Israel's illegal settlements on Palestinian land."

Tech giant urged to publicly support Palestinians

Earlier this year, a group of Jewish employees of Google called on the tech giant to increase its support of Palestinians, during the Israel-Gaza war that left more than 250 Palestinians dead.

In the letter sent to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, employees had called on Google to make a company-wide statement "recognising the violence in Palestine and Israel, which must include direct recognition of the harm done to Palestinians by the Israeli military and gang violence."

"Both Israelis and Palestinians are hurting right now, but ignoring the destructive and deadly attacks faced by Palestinians erases our Palestinian coworkers."