The Wikimedia Israel (WMIL) team is celebrating its selection as next year’s Wikimedia European Hackathon hosts, as announced at the Lyon, France event over the weekend.

“WOW! The Wikimedia Engineering Community just announced that next Wikimedia Hackathon will be hosted in Jerusalem (April 2016)! We are so excited!” writes Itzik Edri, chairman of the WMIL board, on his Facebook.

The Wikimedia annual development community meet-up — the Wikimedia Hackathon — focuses on prototyping, teaming and accelerating the development of new ideas for the Wikimedia Foundation.

“Israel is not only the Startup Nation, it’s also a hackathon nation, with more than 30 nationwide hackathons taking place every year, focusing on things from music to neuroscience to opening up government data,” the local Wiki team wrote in its proposal to host next year’s Wikimedia Hackathon.

The WMIL team proposed to host the event at the Hansen House and lodge people at the award-wining Abraham Hostel.

WMIL hosted 720 participants from 56 countries at Wikimania 2011, in Haifa.