Israel faces a new military and political challenge in the Gaza Strip as Palestinian activists have pledged weeks of protests after Israeli soldiers opened fire Friday on at-times violent demonstrators, killing at least 15.
Palestinians rallied again along the fence dividing the strip from Israeli territory on Sunday, calling for the right to return to homes in what is now Israel, as the Israeli army came under international criticism for Friday’s deaths.
More than 1,400 Gazans were injured during Friday’s clashes, including about 740 hurt by gunfire, according to Palestinian health authorities.
Israeli officials questioned the casualty numbers and said the protest was hijacked by Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization that governs Gaza.
Israel’s military said it used rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse the crowd and only used regular ammunition against what it said were militant attacks during the demonstrations.
“Any country having its sovereignty violated would have reacted much more forcefully,” Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman told Israeli radio on Sunday. He said Israel wouldn’t cooperate with any international investigation.
The protests represent a fresh test for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has enforced an economic blockade on Gaza that has hurt Hamas and blunted its ability to target Israel with rockets.
Leaning Away From Violence
As peace talks with Israel stall, more Palestinians are supporting protests over armed resistance.
Percentage of Palestinians who support:
Joining more international organizations
74%
Popular nonviolence
63%
Dissolving the Palestinian Authority
49%
A return to an armed uprising
48%
Source: Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research poll of 1,200 adults interviewed face-to-face in 120 randomly selected locations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, conducted March 14–17. Margin of error +/– 3%.
Unlike the Palestinian Authority, which runs the West Bank, recognizes Israel and cooperates with its security forces, Hamas vows to conquer Israel and has long been more inclined toward armed conflict than peaceful protest.
“Since they don’t want to go to a full-scale war [or] be criticized on their poor governance, they sacrificed people,” Amos Yadlin, former head of Israeli military intelligence and director of Tel Aviv’s Institute for National Security Studies, said of Hamas.
Protests were used by Hamas to make Israel look bad by putting children and women in front of cameras—and in the way of potential harm from Israeli fire, Mr. Yadlin said. That, in turn, could help make the group relevant again after a series of setbacks over the past year, he said.
Hamas acknowledges it is involved in the protests but denies it is the principal organizer. The group’s leaders have said that Gazans have a legitimate right to protest for a return to Israel.
“I think that Hamas was, and is still, in a very uncomfortable political and financial situation and they realized that this nonviolent activity is the safest way to win popularity,” said Ghassan Khatib, a Palestinian political scientist at Birzeit University in the West Bank.
Hamas has said it doesn’t want another war with Israel. But a flatlining economy in Gaza has caused many Western officials in recent weeks to warn another round of fighting could be imminent.
Israel—which has said that it won’t allow significant numbers of Palestinians to return to Israel, because it risks the country’s Jewish majority—moved to counter condemnations of the Palestinian deaths from its neighbors Egypt, Turkey and Jordan and calls for an international investigation by U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres.
It also sought to counter images circulating on social media and on Arab television that showed Palestinians being shot.
In one example, a Palestinian man, identified by his family as 20-year-old Abdul Fattah Abdul Nabi, was fatally shot in the head as he tried to help another man running away from the border fence, according to his family.
“He was thinking it is a peaceful rally. We never expected it was going to be that bloody,” Mr. Abdul Nabi’s father, Bahjat, said in an interview on Sunday.
Israeli defense officials said the younger Mr. Abdul Nabi was part of Hamas. Mr. Abdul Nabi’s father denied the accusation.
Israeli defense officials questioned the authenticity of videos posted online and released their own films of men they said were Hamas militants trying to breach the security wall between Gaza and Israel.
They also distributed videos that they said showed Palestinians throwing stones and firebombs at the border fence and running toward it.
The Israeli military said 10 of those killed were members of Hamas or other extremist groups. Hamas said five of its members died during the protests, but didn’t name Mr. Abdul Nabi in that group.
The last round of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks broke down in 2014 and the Palestinian leadership has rejected a White House plan to relaunch negotiations even before it has been formally unveiled.
Adding to concerns: The Palestinian Authority, which rules the West Bank, has partly cut off funding to Gaza and said it would stop negotiating with Hamas to unite the Palestinian national movement.
Hamas called on the Palestinian Authority to return funding to the strip given the loss of life at the demonstration.
The protest’s organizers say they will demonstrate until May 15, the day after Israelis annually mark the establishment of their state. They have set up tents, portable toilets and other facilities near the Israeli border to encourage Gazans to stay there and keep protesting.
—Dov Lieber contributed to this article.
Write to Rory Jones at rory.jones@wsj.com
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