Hundreds of thousands of people joined by dozens of world leaders attended a rally through Paris to honour the 17 people killed in some of the worst attacks on French soil.

Among those who attended Sunday's march were family members of the 12 people killed during the massacre at the Charlie Hebdo weekly, a satirical publication that often published cartoons lampooning revered religious figures.

Assailants also targeted a kosher supermarket and police, killing five people.

Each of the families of the Charlie Hebdo staff wore a white bandana on their head with the word "Charlie" written across.

About 2,200 security personnel guarded the route of the march, which ran 3km from the historic Place de la Republique to Place de la Nation in the east of Paris, France's interior minister said, with snipers stationed on rooftops.

French media estimated up to three million people were taking part, with the interior ministry saying the rally was "unprecedented".

The numbers in Sunday's rally were more than those of the marchers who took to Paris streets when the Allies liberated the city from the Nazis in World War II, the ministry said.

Some of the foreign dignitaries attending the event included David Cameron, British prime minister; Mariano Rajoy, Spain's prime minister; German Chancellor Angela Merkel along with Sigmar Gabriel, vice-chancellor and energy minister, and Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the foreign minister.

Others dignitaries were Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, and Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian president, as well as Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko.

Jordan's King Abdullah II and Queen Rania also attended the march.

Later Netanyahu and Francois Hollande, the French president, visited a packed Grand Synagogue in Paris, drawing loud sheers.

Parts of the crowd chanted Netanyahu's nickname "Bibi" and "Israel will live, Israel will overcome" as the leaders arrived for a ceremony for "all the victims".

Israel officials

Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland, reporting from Paris, said French Muslims were having difficulty taking part in a march "where Israeli leaders are participants because they view them as war criminals", an apparent reference to last summer's offensive between the Palestinian group Hamas and Israel, which killed more than 2,100 Palestinians and 72 Israelis.

Paris was rocked by violence on Wednesday with an attack on the office of Charlie Hebdo, that has published cartoons of Prophet Muhammad and other religious figures.

In that attack, Cherif and Said Kouachi shot dead 12 people including some of France's best-known cartoonists.

Five other people died as assailants took people hostage and police battled the attackers to free the hostages.

Cherif told a French media outlet over the phone that he had been sent to carry out the attack by al-Qaeda's Yemeni branch, which has previously launched several attempts to attack Western targets.

A senior member of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) claimed Wednesday's attack, saying it was an operation to avenge the honour of Prophet Muhammad.

Security officials have not confirmed the claim but at least one of the Kouachi brothers was known to have been trained by AQAP in Yemen.

European ministers, as well as Eric Holder, the US attorney general, met in Paris to discuss security threats ahead of the march.

Al Jazeera