About a month ago, I was privileged to be part of a small host group of Israeli bloggers invited to meet with the American Internet gurus visiting here for the Innovation Israel blogging expedition. Rebecca Markowitz, from illuminea (eJewish Philanthropy’s web marketing consultants), wrote a great post for IsraelPlug on their visit.

One of those visiting gurus in attendance was Sarah Lacy.

As part of our occasional off-topic Friday “Made in Israel” posts, here are Sarah’s recent blog comments about her whirlwind trip and yesterday’s article from Business Week.

“This was an incredibly hard column to write, because Israel is such a complex and contradictory place. At the heart of the column are a few questions for the tiny but very entrepreneurial country, which I think is at a bit of a crossroads: Will Israel always be Silicon Valley’s farm team or emerge as a tech hub independent of the Valley? Should it aspire to that? Can Israeli entrepreneurs make great Web entrepreneurs?”

Israeli Tech Sends Mixed Messages: Many of the country’s tech startups have moved to Silicon Valley or set up outposts there. Now they need to innovate and take risks at home.

about Sarah: gifted new blogger, an award winning journalist and author of the just released book, “Once You’re Lucky, Twice You’re Good: The Rebirth of Silicon Valley and the Rise of Web 2.0“. Sarah has been a reporter in Silicon Valley for nearly a decade, covering everything from the tiniest startups to the largest public companies. She writes a biweekly column for BusinessWeek.com called “Valley Girl” and is co-host of Yahoo! Finance’s Tech Ticker.

Shabbat Shalom from Jerusalem