Galiladies is the first-ever community of female tech and social entrepreneurs, as well as small business owners, in the Galilee region of northern Israel. 

The diverse community of more than 2,000 Jewish, Arab, Druze, secular and religious women was established in 2022 by Margalit Startup City in partnership with Jewish National Fund-USA (JNF-USA). 

“We focus on business development and mentorship, but the primary goal is to develop the Galilee by fostering female entrepreneurs’ dreams and initiatives,” Or Nadav Argov, community manager and strategic partner at Margalit Startup City, tells ISRAEL21c. 

Rebuilding following October 7

Galiladies barely had time to host its first in-person event before all activities came to a halt in October 2023, when the Lebanese Hezbollah terror group joined Hamas in its fight against Israel, devastating the Israeli north.

The Galilee, as well as the Golan Heights, bore the brunt of Hezbollah’s massive rocket attacks that did not stop for months on end. 

On March 1, 2025, the government officially declared the area to be safe for the return of residents who were either evacuated or fled on their own. Although some have come back, most are waiting to see how things play out before committing to return. 

“I myself was evacuated with my family for more than 500 days,” notes Nadav Argov, who spent many years living in other parts of Israel before coming back to her hometown of Kiryat Shmona — some 2 kilometers (1 mile) east of the Israel–Lebanon border — not long before the war broke out. 

“But we never stopped working. On October 17, 2023, we held our first meeting on Zoom with all the women from the Galilee spread all over Israel,” she says.

The community managed to stay afloat despite being scattered physically, and even formed 21 running groups across the country, hoping to stage an official marathon in the Galilee one day.

Nadav Argov has returned and is helping rebuild Galiladies in its main office in Kiryat Shmona, right next to where the city’s first medical center is currently being constructed with the help of JNF-USA.  

Now, the community is gearing up to host its second in-person meeting under the banner “Spark Your Career,” in partnership with Wix. 

The new and improved Galiladies 

Nadav Argov says that Galiladies are coming back better and stronger. 

“Since October 7 we have shifted our focus to personal, economic and community resilience,” she notes.

She explains that great importance is being placed on “encouraging the entrepreneurial spirit” among women, and especially young women in their late teens and early 20s. 

“The fact that Galiladies are not in the center of the country, but in the periphery or the frontier of Israel, is a gamechanger, causing the entire region to move forward,” adds Yael Levontin, communications manager at JNF-USA. 

Nadav Argov and Levontin both emphasize that one of the major immediate goals is inspiring the community members who left the Galilee to come back. This includes helping women who lost their jobs or whose businesses went under as a result of the last year and a half of attacks from Lebanon. 

“We have a duty to the Galilee because many of those who were evacuated, to Tel Aviv for instance, saw that it’s much more comfortable living there,” says Nadav Argov. 

Levontin notes that the entire ecosystem of the Galilee is changing in the wake of the war to make the region more appealing, and the Galiladies are leading that change. 

“What we are envisioning is not just ‘the now,’ but also ‘the tomorrow,’ and that’s why we’re investing here,” she says. 

The “Spark Your Career” event takes place on March 25 in Kiryat Shmona. For more information, click here.