section_path: History/2018–2019: Great March of Return
section_name: 2018–2019: Great March of Return
paragraph_text: 2018–2019: Great March of Return
  
  In 2018–2019, a series of protests, also known as the Great March of Return, were held each Friday in the Gaza Strip near the Israel–Gaza barrier from 30 March 2018 until 27 December 2019, during which a total of 223 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces. The demonstrators demanded that the Palestinian refugees must be allowed to return to lands they were displaced from in what is now Israel. They protested against Israel's land, air and sea blockade of the Gaza Strip and the United States recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel.
  
  Most of the demonstrators demonstrated peacefully far from the border fence. Peter Cammack, a fellow with the Middle East Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, argued that the march indicated a new trend in Palestinian society and Hamas, with a shift away from violence towards non-violent forms of protest. Some demonstrators were setting tires on fire and launching Molotov cocktails and rocks toward the troops on the opposite side of the border. Israeli officials said the demonstrations were used by Hamas as cover for launching attacks against Israel.
  
  In late February 2019, a United Nations Human Rights Council 's independent commission found that of the 489 cases of Palestinian deaths or injuries analyzed, only two were possibly justified as responses to danger by Israeli security forces. The commission deemed the rest of the cases illegal, and concluded with a recommendation calling on Israel to examine whether war crimes or crimes against humanity had been committed, and if so, to bring those responsible to trial.
  
  On 28 February 2019, the Commission said it had " ' reasonable grounds' to believe Israeli soldiers may have committed war crimes and shot at journalists, health workers and children during protests in Gaza in 2018." Israel refused to take part in the inquiry and rejected the report.