Gaza Sky Geeks shows another side of Palestinian life under catastrophe: skilled young people still creating, learning and building futures, if the world is willing to open doors.
For almost three years, the images from Gaza have been almost impossible to comprehend. Every evening we’ve seen scenes of destruction, displacement and unimaginable loss.
Recently, however, I discovered another story from Gaza – one that rarely appears in the headlines. It centres on Gaza Sky Geeks, a technology and entrepreneurship hub established by Mercy Corps in 2011 with early support from Google for Startups. Through training, mentoring and connections to global employers, they help talented young Palestinians build careers in the digital economy. Their approach is about creating pathways to prosperity, recognising that meaningful work and opportunity can become part of a humanitarian response.
It’s a story of software engineers developing artificial intelligence (AI) applications, entrepreneurs launching startups, designers working with international clients and young Palestinian professionals seeking mentors while living through extraordinary circumstances.
As I’ve watched and listened to the nightly news, I began to wonder whether conflict had become the only lens through which many of us now see Palestine and the Palestinian people. When violence dominates the whole story, it becomes easy to define people by what they have lost rather than by who they are or what they are capable of becoming.
Humanitarian assistance rightly focuses on immediate needs – food, shelter, healthcare and education. Those priorities remain essential, but when conflict stretches across generations, another question emerges: how do we help people continue to build their lives, careers, families and futures, not simply survive from one day to the next?
One particular story from the Gaza Sky Geeks community has remained with me.
Mahasen Khateeb was a digital illustrator who invested her life savings in opening her own studio before the war. When it was destroyed, she continued creating artwork and mentoring other illustrators despite power shortages, bombardments and constant uncertainty. She was killed in an Israeli airstrike in northern Gaza in October 2024.
Her legacy isn’t only one of tragedy but of extraordinary determination. She believed creativity could be an act of defiance against despair and her message to fellow artists was simple: “Please continue creating, even when darkness surrounds you.”
Behind every story like Mahasen’s is a person with skills, ambitions, relationships and aspirations that existed long before conflict came to define their lives.
Work has always been about more than earning an income. It provides purpose, dignity, identity and the opportunity to contribute to something beyond ourselves.
Today’s digital economy has created possibilities that previous generations could scarcely imagine. Increasingly, skills can transcend borders even when people can’t.
Conflict doesn’t ever erase capability. It doesn’t extinguish curiosity, creativity or ambition. Those qualities endure, even when the circumstances surrounding them become almost unimaginable. However, capability alone isn’t enough.
Careers are built through relationships. Someone recommends us for a role. Someone introduces us to a client. Someone offers advice that changes the direction of our career and someone opens a door that may have been closed.
For people living through prolonged conflict, those professional networks are often difficult, if not impossible, to build. The greatest shortage in skills isn’t talent. It’s connection.
That’s where initiatives like Gaza Sky Geeks play an important role. Since 2011, more than 6,500 young Palestinians have participated in its programs, with many going on to work remotely in the global digital economy.
Australia spends considerable time discussing skills shortages, the future of work and access to skills. At the same time, technology has quietly removed many of the geographical barriers that once determined where work could happen.
That creates opportunities not only for employers but for universities, professional associations, mentors and experienced practitioners to share knowledge, build relationships and widen professional networks that might otherwise remain out of reach.
This isn’t an alternative to humanitarian aid. People can’t innovate without safety, security and the necessities of life. Food, medicine and shelter are foundations that will always come first.
However, humanitarianism can also include creating pathways to prosperity for people to continue contributing their talents rather than waiting indefinitely for circumstances to improve.
The images from Gaza should continue to move us and they should continue to demand our attention and, above all, action, but they simply mustn’t become the only story we tell.
Alongside the destruction is another reality: people who continue to learn, build businesses, write software, create art, mentor others and imagine futures that extend beyond conflict.
Discovering Gaza Sky Geeks reminded me of something both simple and profound: human potential survives even in the harshest of places.
Sometimes the most valuable thing we can offer isn’t only financial assistance, but the opportunity to connect, collaborate and recognise talent wherever it exists.
Perhaps mentoring, professional networks and remote employment can also become forms of humanitarian response, because human potential survives even in the harshest of places – it simply needs someone willing to open a door.
Meg Schwarz
Meg Schwarz holds a Postgraduate Diploma in Counselling and Psychotherapy and brings over 35 years of experience championing social justice, advocacy and consumer engagement. Based in South Australia, Meg has dedicated her career to working alongside diverse communities, including refugees, people with disabilities and individuals with complex trauma backgrounds.With a strong passion for equality and human rights, Meg specialises in fostering meaningful communication, empowering voices through advocacy and creating inclusive spaces for dialogue. Her skills in stakeholder engagement, strategic communication and community development have earned her recognition as a trusted and compassionate leader in her field.