Palestine’s growing technology industry has been torn apart by the war between Israel and Hamas

Image credits: TechCrunch

Paradoxically, Gaza, despite being one of the most economically challenged regions in the world, has always been a technology hub – not just for Palestine and Palestinians, but for the world: international companies have, for many years, sought a presence there to collaborate. Whether with talented tech freelancers or startups that have gradually emerged from the region. For example, according to sources who helped build those bridges, Nvidia, best known for its role in the new AI boom, was Working with at least 100 engineers from the region For years.

Since at least 2008, TechCrunch has covered tech companies outside Palestine, some serving their direct audience, others serving the tech world internationally. Silicon Valley has shown increasing interest in Palestine as a technology hub, but like the ecosystem itself, it is nascent: so far, those working in the region estimate that up to $10 million has been invested in the Palestinian tech ecosystem.

Notably, in 2017, Marc Benioff, founder and CEO of Salesforce, joined Silicon Valley stars in supporting the first-ever programming academy to be established in Gaza.

Gaza Sky Geeksan Alphabet-backed initiative based in Gaza that provides pre-seed investments, training and technology resources to Gazans in Palestine, has been a beacon of entrepreneurship in the region.

All of that has virtually disappeared now, like the buildings in Gaza itself.

Israel is currently retaliating militarily against attacks on its people and territory, and on hostages taken by Hamas – the ruling organization in Gaza that kidnapped at least 150 people and took them to Gaza during brutal attacks on Israel over the weekend that killed 1,300 people.

This strategy saw the bombing of the Gaza Strip to eliminate it from Hamas and recover the hostages. More than 1,500 people have been killed in Palestine so far as a result. Israel’s technology industry – the country’s largest export, and largest single contributor to GDP – is also taking a big hit (read about that here), but the impact on Gaza’s smaller, more fragile ecosystem has, inevitably, been significant. More serious. The resulting physical, economic and societal devastation leaves any future for the technology industry there in doubt.

Quite simply, no one can escape the consequences of war, let alone those working in technology.

“What happens to technology in Gaza is that Israel crushes it. “He obliterated it,” a source inside the region told TechCrunch.

Israel has now massed its soldiers near northern Gaza, ahead of an expected ground attack on the densely populated Strip. About 1.1 million people living in the northern regions were asked to leave the next day. The United Nations warned of “devastating humanitarian consequences” as a result of these recent movements. A complete blockade is being imposed on the area, with fuel, food and water running out. Israel says it will not lift the restrictions unless Hamas releases all the hostages.

He speaks to Ryan Sturgill, a US citizen and former president of the Gaza SkyGeeks accelerator run by Al-Rai Slippery elm barkAccording to the non-governmental relief organization, the situation on the ground appears dire, after waves of bombing by the Israeli army.

“The area around the Mercy Corps building, which housed the Gaza SkyJix team, has been leveled. The structure stands but is destroyed. “The front of it is kind of torn up,” he said.

Gaza Sky Geeks (GSG) is the largest technology center in Palestine, providing a wide range of technology training on a large scale. In 2022, 5,000 programmers and developers from across the West Bank and Gaza Strip will graduate from the program.

Video evidence (pictured above) Posted on LinkedIn It shows a destroyed building marked with a Mercy Corps sign.

“Who knows what will happen. Offices destroyed, fiber lines destroyed. Universities destroyed. Three major universities in Gaza that produce all computer science graduates have been leveled. “I don’t even know if people will be able to return to northern Gaza after what is happening today,” Sturgill added. . “The educational institutions there have disappeared.”

He has been helping Palestinian technology startups raise capital in the West Bank and Gaza since January.

“So far, there has been very significant growth. A lot of companies in Saudi Arabia have set up back offices [in Palestine] To develop for all kinds of new companies and even applications that are now growing in the Gulf, because Saudi Arabia is growing very quickly on the technology front. Nvidia, and other global companies, have outsourcing operations in Palestine. Apple has outsourcing operations, Microsoft has R&D operations, and they would like to see those expand. “There are companies that have 200 developers sitting in their offices in Ramallah,” he said.

I spoke with all the heads of these different offices, most of whom are in Israel. “They are very positive people and want to try to support the tech industry there, and these efforts have been working well and growing,” he added.

In fact, one of the major Palestinian venture capital funds, innovationIt recently raised its second fund, worth $30 million.

It includes high-growth companies emerging from Palestine Mental analyses (Data Analytics, in which Flat 6 Labs invested); Oliveri (Last Mile Logistics, Flat6Labs, and Innovation Fund); Curitava (employee and customer loyalty); And Celinefo (Amazon Fulfillment Partner).

Sturgill said that in addition to the extremely difficult conditions in Gaza, which is being bombarded by Israeli missiles, the situation in Ramallah is “very tense.” I feel like the situation will get worse there in the coming weeks.

Eliana Montauk, Co-Founder and CEO Lighthouse — a social impact startup funded by Y Combinator, Seedcamp, Reid Hoffman, Eric Ries, Marc Benioff, Paul Graham, and Jessica Livingston, among others — told Techcrunch via email that communication had dropped significantly over the past 24 hours.

“Although Gaza has been bombed many times before, it is very different this time for the technology sector for several reasons. The electricity was cut off throughout the place.” [Gaza] Strips. A significant amount of infrastructure has been bombed (including Internet service providers and many high-rise apartment buildings containing cell phone towers). “Entire middle-class neighborhoods have been destroyed.”

She said in the past if an entire neighborhood was destroyed, it was usually a neighborhood bordering Israel and a poor area, so it had less impact on the tech sector.

“The technology sector is almost unable to operate in Gaza at the present time,” she said. “Most people are in too high a risk to work; some have been evacuated three times in the last 24 hours, moving from a friend’s house to the family’s house, because every neighborhood they end up in is the next one that gets bombed. Usually They often receive warnings to evacuate their homes 10 minutes before the bombing, so they do not sleep and constantly monitor the situation and are ready to evacuate within one minute.

“Most people have lost their mobile connections and internet access completely, or can only access the 2G network on their mobile phones. Electricity is no longer available even for a few hours a day now, and people are running out of gas for their needs,” she added.

Al-Manara has about 100 software engineers in Gaza, some of whom work remotely for tech companies in Silicon Valley/Europe.

One software engineer who works at Upwork disappeared for several days, Montauk said, until he was found alive.

Dalia Awad, Medium share The topic of accessing Google from Gaza went viral in 2021 (it was at one point #1 on Hacker News and chirp Written by Paul Graham) She returned to Gaza after interning at Google and Datadog to graduate from university. She had a full-time job offer at Datadog in Paris, but decided to stay home in Gaza and look for a remote job so she could be close to her family.

“Tonight was the worst night ever,” she wrote Tuesday to Montauk. My family and I are fine, thank God. There was bombing everywhere and we couldn’t find out where it was because there was no internet. Many of my friends have lost their homes in the sand area. There is no wifi, we connect to cellular data on our phones but it is only 2G and connects for a few minutes and then disconnects. We can only send WhatsApp messages. So we can’t really read news on social media. In the morning we saw these videos from our friends who shared them on WhatsApp, but downloading a video takes forever for a few seconds.

Montauk said Awad had not responded to her in the past day.

May Tamraz, Beacon’s first employee, is based in San Bernardino, California. Her family lives in Gaza City. They miraculously survived the bombing (published [Content warning] Video on Instagram including bleeding). “My family barely survived an attack on a building next to them in Gaza,” she said. They ask people to leave, where?? No one is saved [sic.] “Anywhere in Gaza.”

“Before this escalation, the technology scene in Gaza was growing,” said Montauk, former director of Gaza Sky Geeks. I was just in Riyadh and met companies that are hiring entire software development teams in Gaza. Upwork and other Silicon Valley companies are now hiring remote software engineers from Gaza. In addition, some have left to work abroad at companies such as Google, Amazon, Qualtrics, and others. The last time I was in Gaza a year ago, almost everyone I spoke to asked me how they could get a job and leave Gaza. They were concerned about more bombings and wanted to raise their children in a place that would not be exposed to such high risks. “These people just want to live a normal life.”

Those living in the West Bank say activity in Gaza has had an unavoidable impact.

“For a young Palestinian woman like me living in the West Bank, I can confirm that there has been a noticeable freeze in activity,” said Lynn Abu Bakr of the organization. Flow accelerator And co-founder of Sawa’id19. “Technology companies are either operating on a very limited scale, with their employees struggling to reach their offices in the West Bank due to unsafe roads closed by occupation forces and Israeli settlers, or they have been forced to stop operating entirely in Gaza.”

She added that a number of buildings in Gaza that are essential for the technology industry there, such as the Al-Watan Tower, have been destroyed. Destroyed Because of the Israeli air strikes and that the technology industry is not the first priority in the urgent situation. “How can you detach from the painful reality and cling to the remaining remnants of hope in your work?”

Muhammad Al-Nobani is a Palestinian founder Middle framean Arab photo platform powered by artificial intelligence tools, aims to break down stereotypes about the Arab world through photos and reduce bias in artificial intelligence.

He told me he was on his way back from… One World Youth Summit In Belfast, he is talking about peace and reconciliation, and is about to reach the border to cross into Palestine to return to his family, when war breaks out.

“The borders were closed and I had to return to Jordan,” he said. “I’m still there, constantly checking on my family in Jerusalem, and trying to communicate with my acquaintances in Gaza.” His co-founder, Raya Fatayer, is in Ramallah, staying at home with her child and husband, and cannot travel.

“The homes of our fellow entrepreneurs in Gaza have been destroyed by air strikes, and we can’t reach some of them anymore because the power is out and they don’t have electricity,” he said. “Dealing with the situation while doing our best to move forward with our work is a daily challenge.”

He said the outbreak of hostilities with Israel was distinctly different: “Previously, every time Gaza faced air strikes, we knew that some areas had become almost safe. “It is clear today that no one is safe.”