Protesters breach Microsoft president’s office, decrying ties to Israel

REDMOND – Activists protesting Microsoft’s work for the Israeli government breached one of the tech giant’s buildings at its headquarters Tuesday afternoon as part of ongoing protests.

The security breach was first publicized at 1 p.m. by No Azure for Apartheid, a group of Microsoft workers and their supporters that object to the use of the company’s technology by the Israeli state and military.

The group said protesters sat and chanted in Microsoft President Brad Smith’s office in Building 34, where they also hung banners. According to No Azure for Apartheid, one sign dubbed the building as “Mai Ubeid Building” – its namesake being the late Mai Ubeid, a software engineer in Gaza who was killed in 2023 by an Israeli airstrike – and another demanded Microsoft to “cut ties with Israel,” among other demands.

Abdo Mohamed, No Azure for Apartheid organizer and former Microsoft worker, said at least seven arrests took place inside the building, a number confirmed by Redmond police.

“Microsoft continues to militarize its campus, to harass, brutally attack and violently arrest its workers and community members,” Mohamed said in a Tuesday phone interview.

Those taken into custody were arrested on suspicion of trespassing, resisting arrest and obstruction, Redmond Police Department spokeswoman Jill Green said.

Redmond police responded to reports of demonstrators on a Microsoft campus sidewalk around 1 p.m. Officers tried to move the seven people who had barricaded themselves inside an executive office. They refused to comply and were arrested, Green said. The demonstrators outside the building moved to a public area and dispersed.

A uniformed member of Microsoft Global Security told a Seattle Times reporter that Building 34 was under lockdown around 2:45 p.m., and entry was prohibited.

Law enforcement officers patrolled the area surrounding Building 34, blocking entrances and exits from traffic. Police set up a command post in a nearby building, and a pair of Redmond Police Department officers mentioned that they were working overtime to respond to the event.

“Workers were back today, community members were back today, saying it very clearly that we will not stop, we will not rest,” Mohamed said. “This violence, this retaliation, this harassment will not deter us from calling out Microsoft, from holding those executives accountable.

It’s an escalation from protests that began on Aug. 19.

Last week, dozens of activists occupied part of a plaza on Microsoft’s campus during demonstrations over two days. Twenty protesters were arrested on suspicion of various charges on the second day, after Redmond police ordered the group to leave. Of the 20 people arrested, one was a current Microsoft employee, and three were former employees “previously terminated for similar conduct,” a Microsoft spokesperson said.

The same group protested Thursday at the Redmond Technology Station near Microsoft’s headquarters.

“To my colleagues, we are not helpless,” Microsoft worker Nisreen Jaradat said at Thursday’s protest. “We are the ones building Microsoft technology. We are the ones keeping Microsoft running. Our labor is power, our voice is power and our collective action is power. We have the choice to reject being a party to genocide.”