"The toughest part was shutting down the service, " says the 33-year-old Mr. Ghajar.

WSJ: Start-Ups Get Snapped Up for Their Talent

Its only non-engineer team member, co-founder and Chief Executive Aydin Ghajar, says he was lucky: Salesforce hired him as a director of product management.

WSJ: Start-Ups Get Snapped Up for Their Talent

At the time of the offer, Mr. Ghajar and his colleagues were making below-market salaries and working in an incubator with about 30 other start-ups.

WSJ: Start-Ups Get Snapped Up for Their Talent

The team was to have moved on from Abassiyeh to the village of Ghajar, on the border between Lebanon and the Golan Heights area, which Israel captured from Syria in 1967.

BBC: UN peacekeepers

Following Wednesday's vote by Israel's security cabinet, control of northern Ghajar will be handed over to the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil), whose mandate is to keep peace in the tense border region.

BBC: Israel approves pullout from Lebanon border village