Israeli police attacked a funeral procession for slain Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh on Friday, beating mourners with batons and causing them to almost drop the coffin.

Thousands of mourners, some hoisting Palestinian flags and chanting “Palestine, Palestine,” attended the funeral for the Palestinian-American reporter, who witnesses say was shot and killed by Israeli forces on Wednesday while covering a military raid in the occupied West Bank.

The mourners tried to march with the coffin on foot out of a hospital to a Catholic church in the nearby Old City.