While many of those attending were civilians, they were sent — against their will — by #Hamas to locations such as this one adjacent to a Hamas military facility, to act as human shields.
"Some of us distracted the Israelis with stones and Molotov cocktails."
Women and children are, understandably, automatically presumed to be innocent by Western observers. But in the course of the demonstrations, women and children frequently participated in the violence.
And see here one youth saying he wanted to "Rip a Jew's head off."
(Note that the @BBC documentary incorrectly rendered "Yahud" as "Israeli" when it actually means "Jew.")
Media reports have a tendency of citing claims rather than stating facts. So, for instance, it's common for journalists to say that Israel "claims" Palestinians were shooting at them.
Well, here's a Palestinian backing up the "claim."
Likewise, media reports referring in brief to "protests in Gaza" and mentioning those killed or wounded tend to neglect to include reference to the improvised explosive device (IED) threat faced by Israel.
Finally, when media coverage refers to the large number of wounded, it's easy to assume that the Israeli military shot wildly.
In reality, there was a dangerous blurring of lines between civilians and combatants, and so Israeli troops shot to halt dangerous activity.
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