Tensions high ahead of Al Jazeera journalist funeral in Jerusalem

GBNews24 Desk//

Israel bolstered security in Jerusalem ahead of the funeral on Friday of veteran Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, two days after she was killed during an Israeli army raid.

Israel and the Palestinians have traded blame over the fatal shooting of the 51-year-old Palestinian-American during clashes in the Jenin refugee camp.

The body of Abu Akleh, a Palestinian Christian born in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, has been transferred to the holy city from the occupied West Bank, reports AFP.

Her coffin began its journey to the drumbeat of a marching band, as crowds chanted slogans demanding an end to Palestinian security cooperation with Israel.

Thousands of mourners are expected to attend the funeral at a church in Jerusalem’s Old City in the afternoon, an Israeli police spokeswoman told AFP.

Roads would be closed along the route of the procession, the spokeswoman said, with extra forces deployed to Jerusalem to “ensure the funeral takes place safely and without violence that could endanger participants or others”.

In a sign of Abu Akleh’s prominence, she was given what was described as a full state memorial on Thursday at Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas’s compound in Ramallah.

Thousands lined the route as her coffin, draped in the Palestinian flag, was driven through the West Bank city, where a street is to be renamed in her honour.