On October 9th, 2023, Zalando’s Management board publicly took a staunch pro-Israel stance to the objection of many of the company’s employees. Those employees were not only repressed, but some of them were actively persecuted. Despite the genocide in Gaza getting worse, pro-Palestine voices in the company, specifically those of Muslim background, were threatened, smeared, and in some cases outright fired, creating an atmosphere of intimidation inside the firm.
After traditional guardrails (HR, compliance, Works Council etc.) failed to protect these employees’ labor and civil rights, a group of employees has worked on exposing Zalando’s anti-Palestine censorship and retaliation campaign.
“Zalando cannot continue to deceive (and make money out of) its customers, shareholders, and employees with this DEI gimmick”, says Mohamad S., an ex-employee who was fired for pro-Palestine speech and is now heavily involved in this effort. “Either they actually commit to these values or the stakeholders have the right to know of the grotesque discrimination taking place on the inside”, Mohamad continues.
After Zalando ignored requests to de-escalate the dispute, Mohamad and his colleagues started an online campaign (See @exposingzalando page on Instagram) to publicize the results of an investigation they conducted by gathering current and former employee testimonies, leaked communications, legal documents, and employee questionnaire results.
“We don’t comment on individual cases” is the line that Zalando’s management has been using internally when asked about this issue, most recently by the CTO in a panel discussion called (unironically as far as we can tell): “How can businesses drive an inclusive democracy?”
Zalando’s management, in the backstages, are expressing expectations for this news to just “fade away.” They seem to focus their discussions on how to deny the facts and smear some of the people involved in the campaign, rather than addressing the actual issue.
Mohamad further comments: “While we recognize the ubiquity of these incidents in Germany, we urge everyone not to let Zalando normalise them. Despite what the pro-Israel elites, such as Zalando’s management board, would like you to think, our observation is that the German legal system has proved reliable in defending the rights of pro-Palestine advocates. The repulsive tactics that Zalando uses to intimidate its employees only work if they remain clandestine. We will make sure they are uncovered.”
