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Comment by dopeboy | Hacker News Reader

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.

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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.

Your comment reminded me of Banksy's recent short film (spoof advert) on Gaza: "Make this the year YOU discover a new destination" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3e2dShY8jIo

Here's a fascinating documentary about concrete smuggling millionaires and the seafront property villas in Gaza:

https://vimeo.com/101819495

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.

Just to add a [hopefully] interesting tidbit from experience as an Israeli:

While Gazans don't really have the option of working directly for companies in Israel because of the travel restrictions, there are IT outsourcing firms in Gaza who contract for Israeli companies. We worked with such a firm in one of my previous job, and I even had the chance to speak to their engineers on the phone once or twice. (Conversation was entirely in English, since they didn't understand Hebrew, and my Arabic is less than stellar to make a huge understatement.) I didn't personally have the chance to meet them face-to-face, but a few of the higher-ups went. The meetings were understandably rare and not easy to arrange, and they had to take place in specified locations in the vicinity of the border checkpoint, as the Palestinian engineers were limited in their allowed travel within Israel. (And the Israelis aren't allowed into Gaza at all.)

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 ?

Here's three actual groups from the hackathon to give you a flavor:

* Homee (pronounced homie as in “what’s up homie”) - a marketplace where people can buy and sell homemade goods. Think Etsy. This group ended up winning first place.

* Debate Time - a mobile app where you can review a product by submitting a video of yourself talking about it. Others reply in video form too.

* Diet Time - a mobile app that let’s you enter what you ate and then tells you how much exercise you need to burn it off.

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