TOKYO (AP) -- More than 110,000 people protested in Okinawa against the central government's order to modify school textbooks which say the country's army forced civilians to commit mass suicide at the end of World War II.

Publishers of history textbooks were ordered in December to modify sections that said the Japanese army -- faced with an impending U.S. invasion in 1945 -- handed out grenades to residents on Okinawa and ordered them to kill themselves rather than surrender to the Americans.

The amendment order came amid moves by Tokyo to soften brutal accounts of Japanese wartime conduct, but triggered immediate condemnation from residents and academics.

"We cannot bury the fact that the Japanese military was involved in the mass suicide, taking into account of the general background and testimonies that hand grenades were delivered," Okinawa Gov. Hirokazu Nakaima told a crowd gathered at a park in Ginowan City.

About 110,000 people -- residents and politicians -- attended the rally, and a total of 5,000 others took part in two other meetings on the nearby islands of Miyako and Ishigaki -- both part of Okinawa Prefecture -- Saturday, said Yoshino Uetsu, one of the organizers.

Saturday's rally was the largest in Okinawa since the island was returned to Japan by the United States in 1972, Kyodo News agency said. In 1995, 85,000 people took part in a rally following the 1995 rape of a schoolgirl there by three American servicemen, according to the agency.

New textbooks for use in Japanese schools must be screened and approved by a government-appointed panel, which can order corrections of perceived historical inaccuracies.

The publishers of seven textbooks, slated for use in high schools next year, had been asked to make relevant changes and submit them for approval.

An official of the Education Ministry said Saturday that the ministry has no immediate plans concerning the amendment. She spoke on condition of anonymity, citing policy.

Accounts of forced group suicides on Okinawa are backed by historical research, as well as testimonies from victims' relatives. Historians also say civilians were induced by government propaganda to believe U.S. soldiers would commit horrible atrocities and therefore killed themselves and their families to avoid capture.

About 500 people committed suicide, according to civic group and media reports.

In recent years, some academics have questioned whether the suicides were forced -- part of a general push by Japanese conservatives to soften criticism of Tokyo's wartime conduct.

The bloody battle in Okinawa raged from late March through June 1945, leaving more than 200,000 civilians and soldiers dead, and speeding the collapse of Japan's defenses. The U.S. occupied Okinawa from the end of World War II until 1972.

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