I understand your point, Armin, about saving or trying to protect every person, even the stupid/stubborn/ignorant ones; that is idealistic. The truth is, some people cannot be saved from themselves, and on top of that they usually represent a threat for others. At some point they have to be left to their own devices, even if that means that innocent people will fall with them.
I think that authorities must do what is right, enforce the law, especially if their violation of the law put other lives at risk. What is not clear in the report is how many other officers were accompanying the attacked female police. Were there more women? how many men? I think it was stupid for a reduced force to try to corral a bunch of agressive fundamentalists (asuming the report is accurate). I wonder what the news would have been had a bunch of agressive male police officers beat up the religious crowd.
I think that beneath this resistance to authority there is an underlying desire to subordinate the laws of men to the laws of god; to impose Church over State.