On Saturday, Israel’s police commander ordered an inquiry into the acts of policemen during the burial of journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who attacked the procession and battered pallbearers, provoking international anger.

Thousands of mourners gathered in Jerusalem’s Old City on Friday to pay their respects to the 51-year-old Al Jazeera correspondent. The Palestinian-American was slain in an Israeli operation in the occupied West Bank two days earlier.

Pallbearers struggled to keep Abu Akleh’s casket from sliding to the ground as baton-wielding police stormed at them, snatching Palestinian flags.

“The Israel Police Commissioner in coordination with the Minister of Public Security has instructed that an investigation be conducted into the incident,” the police said in a statement.

They had coordinated funeral arrangements with the journalist’s family but “rioters tried to sabotage the ceremony and harm the police,” it said.

“As with any operational incident, and certainly an incident in which police officers were exposed to violence by rioters and in which force was subsequently used by the police, the Israel Police will be looking into the events that ensued during the funeral,” it added.

The United States was “deeply troubled to see the images of Israeli police intruding into her funeral procession,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Friday.

The European Union criticized the Israeli police for using “unnecessary force.”

The foundation of late South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, said on Saturday that footage of Israeli police beating pallbearers was “chillingly evocative” of what happened during anti-apartheid campaigners’ funerals.

After Abu Akleh was shot in the head in the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank on Wednesday, Israel and the Palestinians swapped blame. She was dressed in a helmet and a bulletproof vest labeled “Press.”

An early inquiry by Israel’s army found no evidence of who fired the fatal bullet, citing errant Palestinian gunfire or Israeli sniper fire aiming at terrorists as probable explanations.

The Palestinian public prosecution said an initial probe showed “the only origin of the shooting was the Israeli occupation forces.”

Al Jazeera said Israel killed her “deliberately” and “in cold blood.”

The UN Security Council denounced the death in a rare unanimous statement, asking for “a quick, complete, transparent, and impartial inquiry,” diplomats said.

Abu Akleh, a Christian, was a well-known journalist, and her burial drew large crowds.

As her body was being taken from St. Joseph’s hospital in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, police assaulted the mourners waving Palestinian flags.

According to police, some “300 rioters” gathered at the hospital for the procession and “prevented family members from putting the coffin onto the hearse to proceed to the cemetery — as had been arranged and coordinated with the family in advance.”

The police then intervened “to disperse the mob and prevent them from taking the coffin, so that the funeral could proceed as planned,” they said, adding glass bottles and other objects thrown at officers.

According to the Jerusalem Red Crescent, 33 individuals were hurt, with six being hospitalized. Six persons were detained, according to police.

Officers then attempted to stop thousands of mourners from following the casket to the cemetery, but eventually surrendered and did not intervene as Palestinian flags were hoisted, according to AFP reporters.

The United States, the European Union, and the United Nations have all called for an independent inquiry into her death.

Israel has openly requested a joint investigation, which the Palestinian Authority has rejected.

A PA official said on Saturday that the authority would welcome the “participation of all international bodies in the investigation.”

“What happened in her funeral yesterday by the #occupation forces reinforces our position that rejects #Israel’s participation in this investigation,” Hussein Al-Sheikh added on Twitter.

She “was the sister of all Palestinians,” her brother Antoun Abu Akleh told AFP.

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