Today started with a Gospel reading that describes Jesus' triumphant entry into Jerusalem. He is welcomed in by throngs of cheering people who lay down cloaks and palm branches on His path. Commonly, people talk about the fickleness of crowds as Jesus is later condemned by a crowd who shouts for His crucifixion. However, I believe that this is a false conflation of the two different groups of people. The multitudes who welcomed Jesus were those who looked forward to His arrival and genuinely believed in His message. Those who later called for His death were largely not in attendance. If they were, they were quiet about it; after all, the Sanhedrin were only willing to meet at night out of fear of what the crowd that was loyal to Jesus might do.
The crowd outside of Pilate's palace is a different group. They might have assumed that they spoke for everyone because all of their friends were probably thinking the same way, but this was the group who violently opposed the change that Jesus brought with Him. Here, too, were those who followed Jesus, but the roles were reversed from Jesus' arrival. They dared not say anything outright due to the threat of violence that was held over them. Even so, the women along the way, rather than jeering at the condemned prisoner, wailed and wept at His passing.
History is replete with examples of the violent few pushing forward their agenda (often believing that they are right in doing so) to the detriment of their own cause, often with the blood of many on their hands. Those who condemned Jesus did so feeling that His death was the only way to stop the change that He brought forth. In doing so, they actually brought about the destruction of the very thing that they were trying to violently protect.