Israeli startup Onfire has closed a $20 million financing round led by Grove Ventures and TLV Partners, with participation from Sumitomo’s IN Venture and LeumiTech77. The company, founded by former Unit 8200 veterans Tal Peretz, Shahar Shavit and Nitzan Hada, uses AI to mine public developer forums for buying intent signals, then matches those signals to the commenters’ employers and decision‑makers. Onfire’s platform layers budget‑cycle data to help B2B sales teams time outreach, and its early customers include ActiveFence, Aiven, Cyera, Port and Spectro Cloud. The new capital will fund AI, R&D and sales hires as the firm expands its U.S. go‑to‑market operation. Read more →

Microsoft announced it has stopped providing Azure cloud storage and certain AI services to the Israeli Ministry of Defense after an internal investigation linked the unit’s use of its technology to the storage of surveillance data on Palestinian phone calls. The decision follows a Guardian report about Unit 8200’s use of Azure and reflects Microsoft’s long‑standing policy against facilitating mass civilian surveillance. The company said the review is ongoing, while employee activism and protests have intensified around Microsoft’s ties to Israel. Read more →

Reports allege that Israel has been recording and storing millions of phone calls made by Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank on Microsoft Azure servers since 2022. Sources claim Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella personally approved a segregated Azure environment for the data, which Israeli Unit 8200 used to support airstrike planning. Microsoft maintains it has no knowledge of civilian surveillance on its platform and cites an external review that found no evidence of misuse. The revelations have intensified scrutiny of the tech firm’s role in the conflict. Read more →