Great writeup.

You touched on it - but was there much political talk at all? Or was it just the normal kind of conversations?

How was their english?

There was - and I usually started it. I deliberately left them off this piece.

There's general angst against Hamas. There's universal mistrust of Israel. There's a good deal of division on how to engage with the Israelis / what to negotiate for.

Their English is good. They could understand everything I said. Sometimes it took them awhile to express certain words and phrases. During the hackathon pitches, about half the teams opted to speak in Arabic. In these instances, judges were paired with translators.

The only times I read about Gaza is when Israel had just invaded it, pictures of dead bodies and bombed out buildings. Having never seen any description of what it's like inside, reading its name brings up thoughts of suffering and sadness and nothing else.

Thanks for writing this up and taking those photos. I could not have imagined there are places in Gaza that are just like my own office. It looks like a great place to be.

Is there a reason they couldn't work for Israeli companies? Do they even know any Israelis? I'm fascinated by this.

edit - so many more questions:

Besides the curfew, were the girls treated / educated the same as the guys?

Did people have modern hardware? Do you know if it was difficult for them to obtain?

Did any of them work as software engineers for local Gaza based companies?

There are Palestinians that work for Israeli companies. They mostly live in the West Bank.

If you live in Gaza, it's very difficult to travel out of it. The southern border to Egypt is closed. The northern border (which is the one we went through) is open but you need permits to enter Israel. The military takes its time with the permits and it's not always guaranteed you will get one. This makes a commuting sort of setup impossible.

The women there were treated and educated the same. Some of them outshined the guys.

I saw modern laptops and screens where ever I went. Definitely more Android than iPhone. There is difficulty around bringing in 3D printers.

I did not meet any Gazans who worked for local companies. Most seemed to work for the gulf or were working on startups aimed for deployment in the gulf.

Although one could expect it, it's quite refreshing to hear the most educated people in gaza aren't all ok sacrificing their life in suicidal bombings. it makes me think that there's hope that one day they'll get rid of this fanatical regime and make peace.

Could you give a few hints on what were the ideas in the pitch ? Was it about religion ? dating ? or were there some ideas more specific to their condition ?

Political talk is abnormal? The number of conversations I've had about Trump recently must make me an outlier, then.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11859233 and marked it off-topic.

Perhaps I should have been more direct with my point: I think it is disrespectful to Palestinians to expect that their "normal conversation" doesn't include any sort of reference to their political realities, as political realities are part of everyone's normal, in any society that acts even under the pretense of democracy (and Hamas was elected).

It would have been odd if people living in a territory that had electricity for six hours daily and mostly closed/highly regulated borders didn't have normal conversation about topics that are, inherently, political.

Really interesting. Shame that they can't deal directly with Israelis, with all of their start-ups and like-minded technology types.

I can never reconcile my respect and admiration of Israeli achievements in technology with my disgust at their horrible treatment of the Palestinians.

There's no need to reconcile those sentiments. I respect and admire US achievements in technology (and music, cinema, etc), even though the US government has done and does a lot of disgusting things to non-US citizens. There's no contradiction.

Also, consider what policies your fellow citizens might support if your country was surrounded by hostile neighbours. I mean, 40% of the American public supports the "Mexico Wall", even though Mexico is an important trade partner and poses no military threat to the US. Imagine if Mexico and Canada were to declare their intent to destroy the US...

(not assuming you are American, above is just an example)

Israelis are not a "guy". There are multiple segments of the population and typically the technological achievement people and the assholes that go to wars are not the same people.

Just for the record - most people here want peace and are willing to make sacrifices for it. If only it were that simple.

Just for the record - most people here want peace and are willing to make sacrifices for it. If only it were that simple.

Lav davka. Most people want peace for free, and don't see why they should have to do the work of siding with filthy smolanim to counter the settlement movement when the Palestinians aren't trustworthy anyway.

Try attending an antiwar demo and being yelled at that you're a traitor and a dirty Arab if you think most Israelis want peace so much.

If most Israelis wanted peace, they wouldn't vote for the Right.

I'm struggling to imagine a single country in the world that would act as humane as Israel in a similar conflict.

Im struggling to understand what people hear when Amnesty International declares Gaza as worst humanitarian disaster since 1967.

"It could be worst, at least they aren't gassing them in camps"

there are plenty of arab-jewish businesses. in israel, though. arabs are pretty prominent in israeli STEM and medicine

Sadly, not so much in tech. In medicine, yes, very much so. But in 15 or so years of tech career in Tel Aviv I only got to work with or interview (or even receive job applications from) a handful of Arab engineers.

You'd meet more in Haifa area. Arab engineers I worked with in Tel Aviv all came from Haifa, Nazareth or further north.

Excellent write-up and well done for doing this!

Were there any female instructors? If there had been some could they have led a female-only session in the evening?

Context:

    On the first day of the 48 hour hackathon, all female participants had to
    leave by 6:30 PM. This is because, under Sharia law, women cannot hang out
    with men they are not related or married to late into the evening.

(For people like me who glance at the comment thread before reading the article, or who merely skimmed the article.)

Seeing "Sharia law" referred to as a definite entity is a little strange. It's like someone saying "under common law...". It's cromulent, but only on general principals not many specific statutes. There are several countries that follow Sharia, just like many countries follow civil law or common law.

Relevant here because there are countries that follow Sharia that don't enforce such a curfew.

Three of the mentors were female. Many of the staff and local volunteers were female.

That's a good idea. I don't know to be honest.

Did the female instructors also have to leave in the evening, despite them not being Gazan?

Here's an idea: the next time someone asks women to leave because they're not allowed to hang out with men, respectfully suggest that all men leave instead.

Instead of being sexist and asking people to leave based on their gender, ask those who believe in Sharia to leave. Demand that anyone who enters the hackathon makes a public deceleration that they are not followers of any religious belief that treat women and men different.

You seem to have misunderstood what I said. This wasn't at all me being sexist or asking others to be sexist. It was meant to get people to question those rules and motivate men to practice solidarity with women without directly violating the rules and immediately being punished by Hamas. Hamas kills people for the kind of tactics you proposed. If you want to fight Hamas directly, better make sure you have lots of people behind you or at least a good number of trained people with guns.

So by indirectly violating the rules and send a political message by asking all the men to leave, how do you think hamas will react? Do you think they will appreciate that you get people (and media) to question the religious rules? It doesn't sound like people who enforces their religious beliefs with guns aren't going to be happy with political activism, be that indirect or direct.

Maybe the best way to combine a hackathon and political activism is to hold them in places where people do not shot political activists. Its not the best choice, but what is the alternative?

What was the educational background/level of the participants? Where did they get programming skills from?

Are there any relevant internet restrictions?

Is there any program for remote google-hangout type help, or remote buddy system, or something?

What was the process like in terms of applying for the Israeli military permit? Did you experience any problems with border control moving in and out of Israel/Gaza? Did you take your own laptop? What's the internet like? I'm assuming you don't get mobile coverage?

There are ground rules every mentor had to agree to before going. We could not go anywhere unaccompanied - Who's rule is this?

So. Many. Questions!

For the permit, all the basics + scan of passport, LinkedIn URL, my parents' names, and my paternal grandfather's name (!).

No one had any problems at the border. Everyone is super professional and courteous. Those that were muslim and/or of palestinian decent took slightly longer.

I took my own laptop. The only different thing is you have to leave it open (but not unlocked) when it goes through the scanner.

We were mostly confined inside the incubator or a hotel so we had wifi most of the time. I think it's 2G or 3G otherwise. Not sure if by an Israeli carrier or a Palestinian one.

The rules are set by the parent organization, Mercy Corps. They receive the bulk of their funding from USAID and my guess is those ground rules are impacted by that.

> "LinkedIn URL, my parents' names, and my paternal grandfather's name"

Any idea why this info is required?

This is turning into a very interesting AMA. Thanks dopeboy.

I wanted to ask if you felt in any danger at any time. Either in Gaza on onroute through the checkpoints?

What are the ambitions of the participants? Do they want to work / set up companies in Gaza or work abroad?

The Gaza strip is an enemy state of Israel so, if you are Israeli, you immediately lose your citizenship by entering the Gaza strip (or any of the other enemy states).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_nationality_law#Cancel...

cases in which the state can initiate a cancellation of citizenship of an Israeli citizen

That is not the same thing as "you immediately lose your citizenship". Does this actually happen frequently?

this is awesome. do you think you or anyone you worked with might be affected by that terrible anti-BDS law Cuomo passed (if you were in its jurisdiction?)

BDS/anti-BDS has nothing to do with prohibiting working in palestine and traveling to palestine. actually, the BDS movement affects israeli businesses in west bank by boycotting them

The BDS movement seeks to boycott all Israeli businesses, irrespective of their location.

"I met a Gaza Sky Geeks staff member who told me about his story. His parents had to flee their ancestral home from Jaffa in 1948. He lost his childhood home in the war of 2014. He also lost friends and neighbors in the war.

Despite all of this, you would never be able to guess of any of his past after talking to him. In fact, the only reason I knew to talk to him is because I overhead someone else mention his past. He’s the most upbeat, jovial guy at the space who was on his way to the U.K. in a couple days with an eye on a seed round for a startup he’s working on. One might expect atleast some chip on the shoulder, some bitterness, maybe even a little anger. I haven’t seen that from him or any of other Gazans I’ve met and that—more than anything else—has been the biggest surprise for me on this trip.

This is amazing.

The author does a pretty good job of keeping politics out of his article, but my visceral feeling is that you're trying to do quite the opposite here by choosing that specific quote.

The author does not know the history of the land, nor does he claim to. But by drawing HN's readership to the quote about personal loss it's my guess that you're trying to politicize the issue. Maybe I'm wrong, but it's my hunch. I've seen many people use similar tactics before.

>6 The gulf (UAE, Saudi, Qatar, etc) is the regional tech hub.

I would imagine Israel is the regional tech hub, even if there are few to no interactions with tech people in Gaza. Would it be more accurate to say the gulf is the regional tech hub for these programmers' day to day lives?

You're right - thank you. I've just made an edit.

Does anyone know how the IT sector is in places like Dubai? I hear about a lot of need for skilled programmers there, but it's hard to glean insight from Europe. Anyone with first-hand experience?

My father was born in Gaza, but got out as soon as he could and went to college in the states. I'm glad this is happening! There's certainly talent there like everywhere else. A big problem I see with Gaza digging itself out of these problems is the destruction of infrastructure, inability to get supplies and the effect this has on the job market. Software development is one of those few professions that, as you touched on, allow Palestinians to find a somewhat stable flow of work.

Thanks for mentoring and doing what you can there. I'd like to go and see some extended family sometime myself.

Edit: How available are things like computers? I remember when my dad brought electronics over as gifts it was usually something more-or-less unattainable, but this was years ago: Super Nintendos and things like that.

So very true. I think if Mexico and Canada not only declared dead their intent to destroy the US but also decided to shoot rockets onto civilians on a daily basis (as does Hamas launches from the Gaza Strip), there would definitely be a tough response should they not stop (as the military invasion of Gaza). One also needs to consider that Israel offers cost-free, no-strings-attached medical care to Palestinians who show up at their borders with Israel. Israel also provides the Hamas regime and Gazans with power, water, and internet connectivity, all of this despite being fired on daily, having their civilians kidnapped and attacked by smuggling tunnels dug straight into Isrsel's territory, and being threatened with destruction. I definitely don't agree with many decisions the Israeli government has made, but despite what many believe, Israel definitely supports the Gazans and Wesr Bank residents in many ways.

Israel has occupied Gaza and West a bank, and resistance to military occupation is legal per the Geneva conventions. Gaza has always resisted the Israeli occupation hence it's punishment. There are continuous attacks upon Gaza from Israel too. The disparity in armed power and thus destruction is massive. In the last Gaza war about 20000 tons of bombs were dropped on Gaza, whereas what they launched against Israel was maybe a few tons.

1. Israel is no longer in control of Gaza 2. if you're going to fire stuff at a x1000 stronger military power, then maybe it's time you made better decisions (ref: peace deal made by Ehud Barak back in 2000, which Arafat sunk for no good reason)

Israel is in control of Gaza, as recognized by most observers. It controls the airspace, sea, and everything that goes in and out, as well as of course the continuous incursions into the territory.

According to the ceasefires which Israel has signed with Hamas, it's supposed to alleviate the siege on the strip, but it has never lived up to those ceasefires, whereas Hamas has. Continuing to devastate the territory economically, of course the people there will revolt!

Are you joking? If you lived next to Gaza, how could you trust them? They repeatedly have said they want to destroy Israel, in speech after speech, thousands of rockets fired indiscriminately into Israeli towns and villages, dozens of attack tunnels dug, and it's in the Hamas charter that Israel must be destroyed. There's some evidence that ISIS is now operating in Gaza, and some Gazan Arabs have gone to Iran for combat/terrorism training.

If not for the extremists controlling the Strip, and dominating the hearts and minds of its residents, Gaza could be a high tech paradise: foreign investment there could be huge, with Israeli factories and tech centers set up, agricultural enterprises, and billion dollar Mediterranean resorts along the gorgeous coast.

The idea that Gaza is a threat to Israel is not true, Israel has a huge, sophisticated military. It is Israel which is the threat to its neighbors, it's launched many wars. Israel has preached the same kind of destruction about Gaza and actually carried it out.

Regarding the history of Israel and the Palestinians, You should look at the history of the occupation. In the Gaza Strip, the 5m high walls concrete walls between the few thousand settlers who use way more resources, occupied about 1/3rd of the land, while over a million people lived around them in poverty. It's very cruel and brutal apartheid/imperialism by Israel understandably made Gazans angry. Things like arbitrary detention, mass torture of Palestinians, assassinations and so on which are the underpinning of the military occupation, this is what pushes people to extremism.

Well the walls have been working fantastically well for Israel. Suicide bombings just don't really happen anymore. Yeah sure, the knifings have been going on, but those kill a lot less people.

15 years ago there used to be a bombing every week.

"the people there will revolt!"

- As they should, but you got it the other way around. They should rise against the fanatics among them who aim for Islam domination, the destruction of Israel. Those continuously attempting to kill innocent people.

Seriously, why do you think the naval blockade is in place? How does Israel benefits from it?

In any case, there are also a couple of facts you need to look into.

"Israel is in control of Gaza"

- Gaza is ruled by Hamas and it also has a border with Egypt

"it has never lived up to those ceasefires"

- When did they actually ceased to fire? (you know, you can't just occasionally bomb the other side during a ceasefire)

Israel instituted the separation fence in Gaza in 1993 during the Oslo process. It's remained there since despite being explicitly banned by the Oslo treaty, to which Israel is a signatory. It moved immediately to divide the West Bank from Gaza. If you look at the map, Gaza is the one possibly opening to Palestine to the rest of the world, Palestine is otherwise surrounded by hostile countries. This is why the blockade is maintained.

There were have been ceasefires in 2008 and 2012 where there were no rocket attacks. Hamas lived up to it. Most rocket attacks were in reponse to an Israeli action. It's a long history which I don't have time to go through now but has been covered by observers like Noam Chomsky. http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175892/

"Gaza is the one possibly opening to Palestine to the rest of the world, Palestine is otherwise surrounded by hostile countries. This is why the blockade is maintained."

- What exactly do you mean by Palestine? if you mean Gaza and the West Bank, then who are the hostile countries? Egypt, Jordan and Israel? Even if they are all "hostile" what do they gain by maintaining an expensive naval blockade (and providing alternative, regulated by security checks, routes, which also cost those "hostile" countries a lot of money)?

"There were have been ceasefires in 2008 and 2012 where there were no rocket attacks" "Most rocket attacks were in reponse to an Israeli action"

- Absolute lies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palestinian_rocket_att..., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palestinian_rocket_att.... I live here in the missile range. Noam Chomsky, a great linguist, an "Observer" from a different continent, is not a very good historian.

I think if Mexico and Canada not only declared dead their intent to destroy the US but also decided to shoot rockets onto civilians on a daily basis

Oh you mean like many Israelis don't just declare the intent to annex the west bank, but actually have settlements there / support them? The declarations are numerous, here's a recent and particularly shameless one.

http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news//1.723297

Bennett also indirectly criticized Netanyahu for opposing a Palestinian state before the 2015 elections and supporting it after the elections.

"The time has come to say clearly: The land of Israel belongs to the people of Israel," Bennett said. "In Hebrew, English, Russian and French; in summer and in winter; when there are elections and when there aren't. Why? Because the world listens to every word we say."

"The world identifies weakness just as it identifies strength," Bennett added. "The world smells when we aren't certain about our right to the land and attacks us furiously with boycotts.

The people who want to annex the other side - which exist on both sides - each can't be excused with those on the other side.

being threatened with destruction

Not really credibly so, and all the while while expanding settlements, demolishing houses, targeting human rights organizations, killing people and even faking evidence such as https://twitter.com/Channel2News/status/737971602260889600/v... - and other such things which all fall under "definitely not agreeing with many decisions" I would assume.

Yes, there's plenty of terrorism sold as "freedom fighting", and I agree it's terrorism. There's also plenty of blaming Israel for everything while not even criticizing Hamas or the absolutely useless Palestinian authorities. But this tale of bleeding heart Israel trying to do the very best, and being so misunderstood? Just look at a map, even that says a lot.

A far right politician in Israel does not represent the entire country, any more than Trump represents the entire U.S., much less so in fact since Israel is a very diverse multi-party democracy. The settlements are controversial, granted, but they are on barren land and in any event the Arabs simply don't accept any deal that's been offered over the decades. They have responded to every peace offering with horrific, murderous violence. They have no moral superiority. When people are deliberately killing babies and old women, it's very hard to sympathize with their cause. Under the circumstances, yes Israel is a bleeding heart and is doing its very best to restrain itself in the face of horrible provocations, and is very misunderstood by people who have little or no knowledge of the history and facts of the situation.

When people are deliberately killing babies and old women, it's very hard to sympathize with their cause.

Right, and that's after you said "A far right politician in Israel does not represent the entire country".

is very misunderstood by people who have little or no knowledge of the history and facts of the situation.

Notice how you didn't substantiate any of your claims, call the settlements "controversial" and seem to think that they are on "barren land" (right) would be relevant even if it was true, instead of a clear breach of Geneva conventions.

Even if you could justify an occupation, you cannot justify the settlements and the intention they represent, the deed that is being done, and trying to push that on "far right politicians" while treating Palestinians as a monolith, is just having a double standard.

I never claimed Palestinians have "moral superiority" and never would, because that's not how it works outside of sophistry. You don't work out who is worse, and then use them as a scapegoat for everything while absolving those who are "not the worst". Individual crimes do matter, and remain crimes even if the other party commits more. Which is not to be confused with "just because there are unsubstantiated claims the other party commits more", either. And all of that also applies to the "pro-Palestinians" who rage about how "the Zionists" are the worst, and how Israel is the worst. They peddle the exact same logic with roles reversed. "Don't criticize us, criticize them!"

"even if you could justify an occupation"

The so-called occupation is a military administration begun after retreating Arab armies ceded the territories in 1967. This arrangement is legal and covered under international conventions. The U.S. did it in Japan and Germany for five years; the Soviet Union did it in eastern Europe for 45 years. The Chinese illegally occupied the vast lands of Tibet in 1950 and show no signs of letting go and the U.N. says nothing.

The Israelis withdrew from Gaza in 2005, forcibly removing the settlers, and were rewarded with 11,000 rockets. 11,000! They have every right to inspect cargo that enters Gaza; the Syrians and Iranians have long tried to import deadly weapons into that sorry land, and if they ever succeeded, Israel would have no choice but to reduce the place to rubble finally and completely and drive the Arabs from there back into Egypt which is where their ancestors came from 100-150 years previously.

As for "didn't substantiate any of your claims" for Pete's sake open up a newspaper once in a while. Two Jewish women in their 80s were just stabbed to death in Israel -- reports say they begged Arab workers nearby to call emergency services and the Arabs ignored them. Two elderly women in their eighties. Just today, probably while the above commenter was writing that stuff, there was a shooting attack in Tel Aviv, two Arab brothers from Hebron just opened up in a restaurant and killed four people and wounded several others before the police shot and wounded them. The Hamas leader, mistakenly believing one to be killed, called him a "hero". Just today. One of thousands of similar such incidents. Sophistry indeed. This is war, an ongoing and bitter war to drive the Jews out or kill them all. Israelis are totally justified and indeed should be doing a lot more.

"On the first day of the 48 hour hackathon, all female participants had to leave by 6:30 PM. This is because, under Sharia law, women cannot hang out with men they are not related or married to late into the evening."

Why am I not surprised.

There is no as such sharia law that prohibits women to be back by 6:30.

I don't see how this comment adds significant value to the discussion. Anyone care to explain?

I'm an Israeli, I'm also a NodeJS core member and an open source guy with a lot of web experience. I've contacted Gaza Sky Geeks multiple times and offered assistance.

They took almost a month to reply. Apparently, Israelis are not welcome. It's a shame that my only way to experience my neighbors is through serving in an armed forces war.

They probably did a cost-benefit analysis and realised the logistics and effort required to get one israeli into a gaza hackathon were not worth the pay off.

Maybe you could organise a fundraiser to sponsor gazans to come to israel instead. They might like a chance to get out and have new experiences.

Can you explain this: what logistics and effort? They are taking in people from all over the world yet not next door?

Your country is at war with them, and they are mostly on the receiving end.

While I understand it can be frustrating not to be able to attend, certainly you can understand that it may be hard for at least some of the attendants to interact with you without prejudice, and therefore that it's significantly easier to plan without you.

Blame the cause, not the consequence.

I dated a Tunisian guy once and he was also frustrated he couldn't get into an Israeli university solely because of his nationality. This whole rift saddens me.

I agree - it is equally frustrating. If you send me his contact information I'll see if I can contact some people from my university and see if there is something that can be done.

Great story! Thank you for sharing your experiences!

I'm curious how did you find out about the event in the first place?

I work part-time for an Israeli tech company and am a Zionist; I assumed your post would be ultra political and demonizing Israel.

Instead, I was pleasantly surprised to see your post was thoughtful, kept politics out of it and remained focused.

You're helping Gazans live better lives by teaching them a trade skill. That's a real kindness you did. Kudos.