Rights groups criticised the authorities for keeping the 153 passengers including families, children and a woman who is nine months pregnant on a hot plane without food or water.
South Africa is investigating how more than 150 Palestinians from Gaza arrived in Johannesburg on a chartered plane without the correct travel documents, President Cyril Ramaphosa told the Associated Press (AP) on Friday.
The flight landed at O.R. Tambo International Airport on Thursday morning. The passengers were kept on board for about 12 hours while immigration officials questioned them. South Africa’s border agency told AP that the Palestinians could not explain where they were staying or for how long, and they had no exit stamps normally issued by Israeli authorities.
Rights groups criticised the authorities for keeping the 153 passengers including families, children and a woman who is nine months pregnant on a hot plane without food or water.
‘MYSTERIOUS’ JOURNEY VIA NAIROBI
Ramaphosa said officials were working to understand the route the group took. “These are people from Gaza who somehow mysteriously were put on a plane that passed by Nairobi and came here,” he told AP.
The Palestinian Embassy in South Africa said the trip was organised by “an unregistered and misleading organisation” that had “exploited the humanitarian situation” and collected money from families before abandoning responsibility when problems emerged. It did not name the group.
However, an Israeli military official told AP, on condition of anonymity, that an organisation called Al-Majd arranged the movement of around 150 Palestinians.
HOW THE JOURNEY WAS ORGANISED
According to the Israeli official, buses organised by Al-Majd transported Palestinians inside Gaza to a meeting point.
Israeli forces escorted them to the Kerem Shalom crossing. Other buses then took them to Ramon Airport in Israel, where they boarded the flight.
South African authorities said 23 of the passengers travelled on to other countries, while 130 were allowed into South Africa after intervention by the Ministry of Home Affairs and an offer of accommodation by the NGO Gift of the Givers.
Ramaphosa said that despite the lack of documents, South Africa should respond with humanity:
“Out of compassion, out of empathy, we must receive them and be able to deal with the situation that they are facing,” he told AP.
PRESSURE ON PALESTINIANS TO LEAVE GAZA
The lack of transparency around the flight raised concern among rights groups that Palestinians might be pushed out of Gaza.
Israel’s foreign ministry referred questions to COGAT, the Israeli body overseeing civilian matters in the Palestinian territories. COGAT told AP that the passengers left Gaza under a policy allowing departures once a third country agrees to receive them, but did not name that country.
Around 40,000 people have left Gaza since the war began under this policy.
South African NGOs suggested Al-Majd had links to Israel and accused it of helping remove Palestinians from Gaza. They provided no evidence. COGAT did not respond to AP’s request for comment on these claims.
SECOND SIMILAR FLIGHT IN RECENT WEEKS
Imtiaz Sooliman, founder of Gift of the Givers, told AP this was the second unannounced flight to land in South Africa. Another arrived on 28 October with more than 170 Palestinians.
He said passengers on the latest plane did not initially know their destination and received no food during their journey. “They were given nothing on the plane and this must be investigated,” he said.
South Africa has been a strong supporter of the Palestinian cause. It has accused Israel of genocide at the UN’s top court a charge Israel rejects.
The people on the flight reflect the desperation among Gaza’s residents after a two-year war that Gaza’s Health Ministry says has killed more than 69,000 people, more than half of them women and children. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and militants. A fragile ceasefire is currently in place.
Al-Majd Europe, which has been linked in the past to organising travel for Palestinians, says on its website that it is a humanitarian organisation founded in 2010 in Germany and based in Jerusalem.
The site lists no phone numbers or exact address. It claims to work with 15 international agencies, although none are named. A message on Friday warned that people were impersonating the group to collect money or cryptocurrency “under the pretext of facilitating travel or humanitarian aid.”
