g.ho.st and MEET: Palestinian & Israeli computer people working together

Hey, you might have read, last few days, about g.ho.st, a well-regarded effort to be a Web-based desktop, serious technology with real funding. It's a joint effort by Israelis and Palestinians, featured at the D conference as well as recent articles by NY Times and AP.

Some of the same folks are also behind MEET, "Middle East Education through Technology". They're training high-school students from Palestine and Israel to do serious software work. I visited them a coupla months ago, saw some of their work, and was very impressed. They're learning Java as a first language, which ain't easy, but involves good programming habits from the beginning.

All of this is a big deal, indirectly helping all to good jobs and eventual peace.

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Comments

[ArabianMonkey]

This is cool. I'm a big believer that kids in classrooms collaborating, creating together, co-producing develop a certain understanding, tolerance, compassion, and worldliness. When they go out into the hostile world, they take with them all this and that's what helps them overcome the blind politics, prejudices and intolerance. And on a project like g.ho.st they are obviously gearing up with the skills needed for the job market. I did not know abt this project. Thanks for sharing it. I do believe Israelis & Palestinians should learn and do together in the classroom. If they grow up collaborating and trusting each other, a real peace dialog is possible. Politicians today are in too deep and cannot see out of the downward spiral on this topic. A generation that learns together, succeeds together, respects and trusts each other is the hope to find new solutions to old problems. More MEET models are needed I guess.