Police set up checkpoints throughout Jerusalem's Old City, restricting access for thousands of Christian worshippers.
Videos circulating on social media show Israeli forces confronting worshippers, including scenes of physical confrontation and the use of firearms to disperse crowds. The images suggest that some pilgrims were beaten and verbally and physically abused as they tried to reach the church. Christians were pushed back or held for hours. Some were arrested.
Police even restricted access to the church for the Vatican's Apostolic Nuncio to Palestine, Archbishop Adolfo Tito Yllana.
The Higher Presidential Committee for Church Affairs in Palestine condemned the "violation of diplomatic norms and religious freedom".
The committee added that Israel had turned a sacred occasion into a militarised ordeal and called for international intervention to uphold freedom of worship: "This is not about security. It is a policy designed to erase Jerusalem's religious and cultural diversity".
For Christians in the West Bank, only 6,000 permits have been issued this year, despite a community of some 50,000.
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