A Central Square, Cambridge, building that had hosted a regularly protested company is quiet Wednesday. (Photo: Marc Levy)

The U.S. arm of Israeli defense contractor Elbit Systems has ended its lease of office space at a Central Square building after months of demonstrations by pro-Palestinian protestors seeking to drive the company out of Cambridge.

An Elbit subsidiary, medical technology company KMC Systems, moved into the building at 130 Bishop Allen Drive in December 2021. The lease was expected to last into 2025.

Elbit Systems of America said Wednesday that it “regularly makes real estate decisions that best serve our company and our employees” and that its “decision to seek more suitable office space” for KMC wouldn’t affect its jobs, products or employees. A spokesperson said the company is “currently reviewing a number of sites” for its next location.

BDS Boston, the organization that led the protests, said the end of Elbit’s lease “is a testament to our collective power,” crediting “varied community efforts” for disrupting the operations of Elbit and its landlord, Intercontinental Management Corp., and “forcing the early termination of the lease.” The group vowed to keep fighting to “prevent Elbit from moving to another nearby location.” It also said it will continue efforts to “sever Elbit’s ties with MIT and other actors in the Boston area.” An Intercontinental regional director, Scott Kelly, confirmed earlier in the day that Elbit had terminated its lease.

“We will not consider ourselves victorious until Elbit Systems is dismantled and until Palestine is liberated,” BDS Boston said. BDS stands for “Boycott, Divest and Sanction,” a movement to exert economic and political pressure to force Israel to end actions against Palestinians in the Middle East.

Recently the Cambridge office had been virtually empty, with almost all employees working from home. Postings for job openings said they were in Merrimack, New Hampshire.

Protesters had gathered outside the Bishop Allen Drive building since last August, when they demonstrated against human rights abuses in the Philippines and said Elbit supplied weapons to that country’s military. City councillors removed Elbit’s name from a resolution decrying rights violations and killings in the Philippines because, they said, the American arm of the company wasn’t providing the weapons; they were coming from Elbit in Israel.

Councillors also said the Elbit subsidiary in Cambridge, KMC, is involved in medicine, not weaponry. KMC makes and designs equipment used in biomedical research. Still, last October pro-Palestinian demonstrators began targeting the company, after Hamas killed about 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages in a surprise attack on Israel. Retaliation by Israel led to a large-scale military assault in Gaza that has killed about 40,000 people, according to Gaza health officials.

A demonstration last Oct. 30 turned violent as protesters tried to vandalize the building with paint and eggs and attacked officers, police said. Nine people were arrested on a range of charges including disorderly conduct, vandalism, assaulting a police officer and interfering with police. As of mid-August, seven of the nine had reached agreements with prosecutors allowing the charges to be dropped if the defendants stayed away from Elbit for six months.

Demonstrations have been peaceful since then. Protestors scheduled them every Wednesday, usually with a couple dozen people showing up at Bishop Allen Drive and Prospect Street, chanting slogans such as “Elbit is not welcome here.” 

The most recent protest on Monday, drew 100 to 125 people, Cambridge Police Department spokesperson Robert Goulston said. “There were no arrests or reported issues,” Goulston said.