Tech titan Google fretted that agreeing to provide cloud services to the Israeli government would damage its reputation, and those concerns have been exacerbated by recent employee protests over the contract, according to a new report from the New York Times.

In 2021, Google announced Project Nimbus, an ambitious initiative aimed at transitioning many Israel government ministries’ databases to the cloud.

The seven year deal is worth $1.26 billion, with a large portion of that money – $528 million – coming from Israel’s Defense Ministry.