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Palestinian activism evolves in Prawer protests

Nonpartisan Palestinian youths have taken the lead in nationwide protests against Israel's Prawer Plan, breaking away from traditional Palestinian political forces.
Members of the Bedouin community gesture during a protest outside a court in the southern city of Beersheba, calling to release people who were arrested last Saturday in protests against a government plan to force 40,000 Bedouins living in the southern Negev region to leave their villages, December 5, 2013. Hundreds of Bedouin Arabs and their supporters clashed with Israeli forces on Saturday in the protests, in which, according to an Israeli police spokesman, at least 28 people had been arrested. REUTERS/A
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RAMALLAH, West Bank — A feeling of satisfaction has spread among Palestinian activists and their supporters after the Nov. 30 protests against the Israeli Prawer Plan in the Negev. Salah al-Khawaja, a leading member of the Al Mubadara (The Initiative) Movement and an expert on popular and civic resistance activities, told Al-Monitor that similar events occurred in 24 countries around the world that day, as well as in Palestinian lands occupied in 1967 and Galilee.

These protests raised a number of questions about the organizational framework and courses of action currently available to Palestinians. These include the identity of the factions that could actually take the lead on the Palestinian arena, whether the situation is expected to escalate to a third intifada and how coordination was achieved over such a multi-faceted issue.

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