By Mel Frykberg
"BEIT UMMAR, Occupied West Bank, Jul 29, 2011 (IPS) - Leading members of the Palestinian Popular Committees in the West Bank plan massive civil unrest and disobedience against the Israeli occupation authorities come September when the Palestinians take their case for statehood to the UN.
"We plan to take to the streets en masse," Musa Abu Maria, a leading member of the Popular Committee in Beit Ummar, a town 11 km north of Hebron in the southern West Bank told IPS. "We will block entire highways leading to and from Israel’s illegal settlements. We will march on settlements. But these will be non-violent and the protestors will be peaceful.....
Apart from mass marches and protests the Popular Committees are working with various grassroots organisations in Europe, including the Boycott, Disinvestments and Sanctions (BDS) campaigners, who are going to hold parallel protests and marches while calling for an economic boycott of Israeli goods and products.
Abu Maria believes that if the Palestinian leadership is not pro-active in guiding people in the near future, they will organise the revolution on their own. This happened during the first Palestinian Intifadah when the exiled Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) had to follow the lead of the Palestinian street when the uprising broke out in 1987.
"I have been politically involved since I was 15 and first imprisoned by the Israelis. I have my ear to the ground, I have many contacts and I know the way people think here. We will not stop until we have our freedom and independence. The writing is on the wall," Abu Maria told IPS. "
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