Future Cities

In the first episode of Holy Land, WIRED visits Jerusalem Tel Aviv and Ramallah, to investigate how technology and innovation are emerging to become the region's dominant themes.

In this second episode, we visit Rothschild Boulevard in the heart of Tel Aviv to explore how the city flourished so quickly as a vibrant innovation hub. Liberalism, youth and cultural embrace of both failure and debate are all part of the city’s creative DNA. We are reminded that tech entrepreneurs see the world differently, finding problems that others fail to notice. And we explore the exciting scene developing amongst their neighbours in young and liberal Ramallah – despite the many hurdles standing in their way.

In the third instalment of Holy Land, WIRED explores how the power of fantasy continues to shape the region's tech ecosystem. We examine Shimon Peres’s extraordinary legacy in shaping Israeli innovation, tracing the evolution of the country’s world-leading education and R&D. We visit miLAB at IDC Herzliya, a prototyping centre that focuses on physical-digital interaction, an IDF intelligence unit to learn about the military’s unique hierarchical structure and autonomous drone startup Airobotics. Finally, we travel to Jerusalem, a city ‘complicated beyond description’, where we hear from Andy Dwonch of Gaza Sky Geeks, and Hani Alami of JEST to learn about how the political landscape in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem affects innovation.

We hear how gaps in the workforce will be filled by the ‘second wave of immigration’, meet a Haredi mother defying the odds with her home-based startup and visit a special intelligence unit of the IDF made up of uniquely gifted cadets. We also visit the government-planned tech-city of Be’er Sheva and trace Israel’s socialist roots though a startup accelerator based in a Kibbutz. And we head to Palestine's planned city of Rawabi and discover how the region's growth depends collaboration and bridging political divisions.

We look at Israel’s developing relationship with the manufacturing super hub of Shenzhen in the face of increasing pressure from the West, and hear how the young nation’s flexibility puts it in the perfect position for technological convergence. And we ask: what kind of ecosystem could finally emerge if conflict in the region was to end?