Berber Spring the Berber language is now a national language of Algeria. However, this is still distinct from Arabic, which remains the official language, and many other points of contention remain. Since January 2011 massive Berber activism re-emerged in North Africa in the wake of the Tunisian revolution and the overthrow of the Tunisian president Ben Ali, in what Berbers sometimes call the Berber-Arab Spring. This time, Berber activists were much more active and vocal on the streets of Morocco and Libya compared to Algeria. In Libya, Berber rebels helped topple Gaddafi, as the offensive that captured Tripoli and greatly helped end
Berber languages while the Kabyles called theirs "Taqbaylit", and the inhabitants of the Siwa Oasis called their language "Siwi". In Tunisia, the local Amazigh language is usually referred to as "Shelha", a term which has been observed in Morocco as well. One group, the Linguasphere Observatory, has attempted to introduce the neologism "Tamazic languages" to refer to the Berber languages. Berber is a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. Since modern Berber languages are relatively homogeneous, the date of the Proto-Berber language from which the modern group is derived was probably comparatively recent, comparable to the age of the Germanic or Romance