Employee activism | Protests at Microsoft's 50th anniversary celebrations over leads to sackings

Two Microsoft employees have been dismissed after staging public protests during the company’s 50th anniversary celebrations, raising fresh questions for HR leaders over employee activism and corporate responses to politically charged workplace incidents.

Software engineers Ibtihal Aboussad and Vaniya Agrawal were both removed from the business following separate interruptions at high-profile events held at Microsoft’s Redmond, Washington campus.

The incidents centred on the company’s ongoing cloud services contract with the Israeli government and were linked to concerns over the war in Gaza.

Aboussad interrupted a keynote presentation by Mustafa Suleyman, Microsoft’s Head of Consumer AI, accusing the company of supplying artificial intelligence technology to the Israeli military and alleging it was complicit in the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians.