There is much dispute as to what happened. But Urquart is misleading:

Turkey cooled diplomatic relations with Israel after nine of its citizens were shot dead by Israeli commandos who landed on the Mavi Marmara to prevent its passage to Gaza. Protesters on the ship repelled the first wave of lightly armed commandos, but then the Israeli soldiers used lethal force against the unarmed passengers to end their resistance.

The word unarmed suggests that the people onboard were, well, unarmed. The word still sits on the Guardian’s website. Now, though, the paper has added a footnote:

• Footnote added on 14 September 2012. The reference in this article to passengers being “unarmed” is used in conventional contrast to the IDF soldiers being armed with guns.

You can only be armed if you have a gun. As such, all robberies that feature coshes, knives, swords and othet non-guns will be reported in the Guardian as unarmed robberies. The paper adds:

A 2011 UN report into the incident found some passengers on the Mavi Marmara were equipped with metal bars, chains, slingshots and staves but said “no evidence has been provided to establish that any of the deceased were armed with lethal weapons”

Depends how you use those tools, no? And notice how Urquart leaves knives from the list of non-lethal weapons. Knives like the ones some of the peaceniks onboard the ship carried. He also fails to note that, reportedly, the unarmed relieved an Israeli soldier of his gun.

Another view went:

The attackers had already seized two pistols from the commandos, and fired repeatedly at them. Facing more than a dozen of the mercenaries, and convinced their lives were in danger, he and his colleagues opened fire, he said. S. singlehandedly killed six men. His colleagues killed another three.

Nine people were killed during that raid. Why add to the story with bullshit and lies?

You can read the UN report here – it mentions:

The Panel accepts, therefore, that soldiers landing from the first helicopter faced significant, organized and violent resistance from a group of passengers when they descended onto the Mavi Marmara. Material before the Panel confirms that this group was armed with iron bars, staves, chains, and slingshots, and there is some indication that they also used knives. Firearms were taken from IDF personnel and passengers disabled at least one by removing the ammunition from it. Two soldiers received gunshot wounds. There is some reason to believe that they may have been shot by passengers, although the Panel is not able to conclusively establish how the gunshot wounds were caused. Nevertheless, seven other soldiers were wounded by passengers, some seriously.