South Africa investigates mystery of a plane that arrived with more than 150 Palestinians from Gaza

JOHANNESBURG — South Africa’s intelligence services are investigating who was behind a chartered plane that landed in Johannesburg with more than 150 Palestinians from war-ravaged Gaza who did not have proper travel documents and were held onboard on the tarmac for around 12 hours as a result, the country’s president said Friday.

The plane landed Thursday morning at O.R. Tambo International Airport, but passengers were not allowed to disembark until late that night after immigration interviews with the Palestinians found they could not say where or how long they were staying in South Africa, South Africa’s border agency said.

It said the Palestinians also did not have exit stamps or slips that would normally be issued by Israeli authorities to people leaving Gaza.

The actions of South African authorities in initially refusing to allow the passengers off the plane provoked fierce criticism from non-governmental organizations, who said the 153 Palestinians — who included families with children and one woman who is nine months pregnant — were kept in dire conditions on the plane, which was extremely hot and had no food or water.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said there was an investigation to uncover how the Palestinians came to South Africa via a stopover in Nairobi, Kenya.

“These are people from Gaza who somehow mysteriously were put on a plane that passed by Nairobi and came here,” Ramaphosa said.

Palestinians being ‘exploited’

The Palestinian Embassy in South Africa said in a statement the flight was arranged by “an unregistered and misleading organization that exploited the tragic humanitarian conditions of our people in Gaza, deceived families, collected money from them, and facilitated their travel in an irregular and irresponsible manner. This entity later attempted to disown any responsibility once complications arose.”

It didn’t name who chartered the flight, but an Israeli military official, speaking anonymously to discuss confidential information, said an organization called Al-Majd arranged the transport of about 150 Palestinians from Gaza to South Africa.

The official said that Israel escorted buses organized by Al-Majd that brought Palestinians from a meeting point in the Gaza Strip to the Kerem Shalom crossing. Then buses from Al-Majd picked the Palestinians up and brought them to Ramon airport in Israel, where they were flown out of the country.

South African authorities said 23 of the Palestinians had traveled onwards to other countries, without naming those countries, but 130 remained and were allowed in after intervention from South Africa’s Ministry of Home Affairs and an offer by an NGO called Gift of the Givers to accommodate them.

“Even though they do not have the necessary documents and papers, these are people from a strife-torn, a war-torn country, and out of compassion, out of empathy, we must receive them and be able to deal with the situation that they are facing,” Ramaphosa said.

Shadowy operation

The secretive nature of the flight raised fears among rights groups that it marked an attempt by the Israeli government to push Palestinians from Gaza.

Israel’s foreign ministry referred questions to the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the Israeli authority responsible for implementing civilian policies in the Palestinian territories. It said the Palestinians on the charter plane left the Gaza Strip after it received approval from a third country to receive them as part of an Israeli government policy allowing Gaza residents to leave. It didn’t name the third country.

Around 40,000 people have left Gaza since the start of the war under the policy.

Israel’s government had embraced a pledge by U.S. President Donald Trump to empty Gaza permanently of its more than 2 million Palestinians — a plan rights groups said would amount to ethnic cleansing. At the time, Trump said they would not be allowed to return.

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Trump has since backed away from this plan and brokered a ceasefire between Israel and the militant group Hamas that allows Palestinians to remain in Gaza.

South African leader Ramaphosa said that it appeared the Palestinians who arrived in Johannesburg were being “flushed out” of Gaza, without elaborating. The comment followed allegations by two South African NGO representatives who claimed that Al-Majd was affiliated with Israel and working to remove Palestinians from Gaza.

They offered no evidence for the claims and COGAT didn’t respond to a request for comment on those allegations.

Gift of the Givers founder Imtiaz Sooliman, one of those to allege involvement by what he called “Israel’s front organizations,” said this was the second plane to arrive in South Africa in mysterious circumstances after one that landed with more than 170 Palestinians onboard on Oct. 28. The arrival of that flight was not announced by authorities.

Sooliman said the passengers on the latest plane did not initially know where they were going and were given no food for the two days it took to travel to Johannesburg.

“They were given nothing on the plane itself and this must be challenged and investigated,” Sooliman said.

South Africa has long been a supporter of the Palestinian cause and a critic of Israel and has led the international pro-Palestinian movement by accusing Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza in a highly contentious case at the United Nations’ top court. Israel denies committing genocide and has denounced South Africa as the “legal arm” of Hamas.

The people that ended up in South Africa underlined the desperation of Palestinians following a two-year war that has killed more than 69,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, and reduced the territory to rubble. The ministry’s death toll does not distinguish between militants and civilians, but it says more than half of those killed were women and children. A fragile ceasefire is in place.

Jerusalem-based organization

An organization called Al-Majd Europe has previously been linked to facilitating travel for Palestinians out of Gaza. It describes itself on its website as a humanitarian organization founded in 2010 in Germany and based in Jerusalem that provides aid and rescue efforts to Muslim communities in conflict zones.

The website does not list office phone numbers or its exact address. It states that Al-Majd Europe works with a variety of organizations including 15 international agencies, but no organizations are listed and a “will be announced soon” message was displayed in that section on Friday.

Another message that appeared Friday on the website said people were impersonating it to request money or cryptocurrency “under the pretext of facilitating travel or humanitarian aid.” Al-Majd Europe didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment sent to an email address given on its site.