Ex-Meta engineer sues company, claiming he was fired over handling of Palestine content

Ferras Hamad, a former engineer at Meta’s machine learning team, has filed a lawsuit against the company, alleging that he was terminated due to his handling of Palestine-related Instagram posts. According to Reuters, Hamad claims that Meta engaged in discrimination, wrongful termination, and displayed bias against Palestinians. He raised concerns about the company’s handling of restrictions on content from Palestinian Instagram users, resulting in their content being restricted from feeds and searches. One incident involving a video of a destroyed building in Gaza, captured by Palestinian photojournalist Motaz Azaiza, allegedly led to Hamad’s dismissal in February.

Hamad discovered that the video was incorrectly labeled as pornographic. Despite receiving conflicting guidance on his role in addressing the issue, he was later informed in writing that resolving such issues was within his job responsibilities. However, a month later, he was informed that he was under investigation. In response, Hamad filed an internal discrimination complaint, but he was subsequently terminated, with the reason cited being a violation of the policy prohibiting employees from working on issues involving individuals they know personally. Hamad, a Palestinian-American, denied having a personal relationship with Azaiza.

In his lawsuit, Hamad also accused Meta of deleting internal communications discussing the deaths of employees’ relatives in Gaza. Employees using the Palestinian flag emoji were reportedly investigated, while those who used the Israeli or Ukrainian flags in similar contexts were not subjected to the same scrutiny.

Prior to the Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7, Meta faced accusations of suppressing pro-Palestine content. Senator Elizabeth Warren previously raised concerns about Instagram users being “shadowbanned” for sharing content related to Gaza. Meta’s Oversight Board previously acknowledged errors in removing a video depicting the aftermath of an attack on Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza. Recently, the board initiated an investigation into Facebook posts containing the phrase “from the river to the sea.” We have reached out to Meta for a statement regarding Hamad’s lawsuit and will update this post accordingly.