"Microsoft fires four more staff for protesting company’s ties to Israel", 30 August 2025

...Microsoft has fired four employees after they took part in protests against the company’s ties to Israel amid the ongoing war on Gaza.

Two of the protesters had taken part in a sit-in at the company’s president’s office.

According to reports citing the protest group No Azure for Apartheid, both Anna Hattle and Riki Fameli received voicemails from the company informing them that they had been fired.

The pair were among seven others who were arrested earlier this week after they occupied the company President, Brad Smith’s, headquarters.

A day later, two other workers identified as Nisreen Jaradat and Julius Shan were also terminated from working for the company.

Microsoft confirmed that the staff were fired due to breaches of company policies. In a statement issued on Thursday, they said that encampments at the Microsoft headquarters had "created significant safety concerns".

Smith said that the company respects "freedom of expression that everyone in this company enjoys as long as they do it lawfully".

The protest encampment had been organised to firmly reject and denounce the company’s links to Israel, as the death toll mounts in Gaza.

In a statement, Hattle addressed her firing, writing: "We are here because Microsoft continues to provide Israel with the tools it needs to commit genocide while gaslighting and misdirecting its own workers about this reality".

The protests from Microsoft workers come after investigations have shown that an Israeli military surveillance agency was using Microsoft’s Azure software to track and store recordings of mobile phone calls made by Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank...

The investigation, carried out by +972 Magazine, Local Call and The Guardian, found that Israel was depending on Microsoft cloud for the surveillance of Palestinians...