Photos: Palestinians mark 74th Nakba Day

Thousands of Palestinians rallied on Sunday during Nakba Day – what Palestinians call “the catastrophe” that befell them in the war that led to the establishment of Israel in 1948.

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were forcibly displaced from their homes during and after the war.

The Nakba refers to the systematic ethnic cleansing of one-third of the Palestinian population at the time by Zionist paramilitaries between 1947-1949 and the near-total destruction of Palestinian society.

About 750,000 Palestinians out of a population of 1.9 million were expelled from their towns and villages to make way for new Jewish immigrants.

The anniversary comes when many are angered by the killing of prominent Al Jazeera veteran journalist Shireen Abu Akleh.