Palestinians are taking their economic future into their own hands, riding on an explosion in tech startups.  

Ahmad Ramahi’s success has been a long time coming. Eight years after he graduated from Ramallah’s Birzeit University and jumped into entrepreneurship against the odds in a battered economy, Ramahi’s business-to-business crowdsourcing delivery and logistics company, WeDeliver, has turned into the fastest-growing startup in the Palestinian territories. Operating throughout the occupied West Bank, it is enjoying double-digit growth since its launch earlier this year and is the first startup to boast of a Palestinian angel investor.

WeDeliver’s emergence is part of a pattern that could transform the Palestinian territories. Since 1967, the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem have been under Israeli occupation. They’ve endured increasingly strict restrictions imposed by the Israeli military, which has choked the economy. A 2016 U.N. report concluded that the Palestinian territories’ economy might double in size if the occupation were lifted. But where most traditional businesses are unfeasible, a young generation of Palestinians is driving an explosion in tech startups as an alternative route to catapult the Palestinian economy forward.

Flow, a “one-stop shop” incubator and accelerator program, serves as a backbone to young startup teams and their needs, even post-investment. Fikra Hub — a subsidiary of the largest Palestinian telecommunications company, PalTel group — is another successful incubator, which enjoys the support of the company’s generous venture capital fund. WeDeliver was Fikra’s first partnership.

Sourced through Scoop.it from: www.ozy.com