South African intelligence services are investigating who was behind a chartered plane that landed in Johannesburg carrying more than 150 Palestinians from war-torn Gaza who did not have proper travel documents and were held on board for about 12 hours as a result, the country’s president said on Friday.
“The plane landed at OR Tambo International Airport on Thursday morning, but passengers were not allowed to disembark until late at night after immigration interviews with the Palestinians revealed they could not say where or how long they had been in South Africa,” South Africa’s border agency said, as reported by the AP.
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The report said the Palestinians lacked the exit stamps or slips usually issued by Israeli authorities when leaving Gaza.
South African authorities’ initial refusal to let the passengers disembark drew sharp criticism from NGOs, which said 153 Palestinians – including families with children and a woman nine months pregnant – were trapped on the plane in terrible conditions, in extreme heat and without food or water.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has said an investigation is underway to find out how the Palestinians entered South Africa via a stopover in Nairobi, Kenya.
“They are people from Gaza who in some mysterious way were put on a plane that flew past Nairobi and came here,” Ramaphosa said.
What did the Palestinian embassy in South Africa say?
The Palestinian embassy in South Africa said in a statement that the flight was organized by “an unregistered and misguided organization that abused the tragic humanitarian conditions of our people in Gaza, defrauded families, extorted money from them and facilitated their travel in an irregular and irresponsible manner. This entity later tried to disclaim any responsibility once complications arose.”
It did not say who chartered the flight, but an Israeli military official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of confidential information, said an organization called Al-Majd had arranged to transport about 150 Palestinians from Gaza to South Africa.
The official said Israel accompanied 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 up the Palestinians and took them to Ramon Airport in Israel, from where they were flown out of the country.
South African authorities say the Palestinians traveled without naming…
South African authorities said 23 Palestinians had traveled to other countries, without naming those countries, but 130 remained and were allowed to enter after intervention by South Africa’s interior ministry and an offer by an NGO called Gift of the Givers to house them.
“Even if they don’t have the necessary documents and papers, they are people from a country torn by strife, by war, and out of compassion, out of empathy, we have to accept them and be able to deal with the situation they face,” Ramaphosa said.
The mysterious nature of the flight raised concerns among rights groups that it represented an attempt by the Israeli government to force Palestinians out of Gaza.
Israel is a cause for concern
Israel’s Foreign Ministry directed questions to the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the body responsible for implementing civilian policy in the Palestinian territories.
According to COGAT, the Palestinians on a chartered plane left Gaza after receiving the consent of a third country to accept them, as part of Israel’s policy of allowing Gazans to leave. The third country was not named.
Israel-Gaza War
About 40,000 people have left Gaza under this policy since the start of the war.
Israel’s government has accepted US President Donald Trump’s pledge to permanently empty Gaza of more than 2 million Palestinians – a plan rights groups say would amount to ethnic cleansing. Trump said at the time that they would not be allowed to return.
Temporary tents stretch along the beach in Deir al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, Saturday, Nov. 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Trump has since backed away from that plan and brokered a truce between Israel and the militant group Hamas that allows Palestinians to remain in Gaza.
South African leader Ramaphosa said the Palestinians who arrived in Johannesburg appeared to have been “expelled” from Gaza, without elaborating. The comment followed accusations by two South African NGO representatives that Al-Majd was linked to Israel and was working to remove Palestinians from Gaza.
They provided no evidence for the claims and COGAT did not respond to a request for comment on the claims.
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Dar Givers founder Imtiaz Sooliman, one of those who say they were involved with what he called “Israeli front organizations,” said it was the second plane to arrive in South Africa under mysterious circumstances after one that landed with more than 170 Palestinians on board on October 28. The authorities did not announce the arrival of this flight, AP reported.
Sooliman said passengers on the newest plane initially did not know where they were going and were given no food for the two days it took to get to Johannesburg.
“They didn’t give them anything on the plane itself and that has to be challenged and investigated,” Sooliman said.
South Africa has long supported the Palestinian cause and criticized Israel, leading the international pro-Palestinian movement by accusing Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza in a highly contested case at the UN’s highest court.
Israel denies committing genocide and has condemned South Africa as a “legal arm” of Hamas.
Here’s what the Palestinians are saying
The people who ended up in South Africa underscored the desperation of Palestinians after a two-year war that Gaza’s health ministry says has killed more than 69,000 Palestinians and reduced the territory to rubble, the AP reported.
The ministry’s death toll does not distinguish between militants and civilians, but says more than half of those killed were women and children. A fragile truce is in place.
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An organization called Al-Majd Europe has previously been linked to facilitating the travel of Palestinians from Gaza. On its website, it describes itself as a humanitarian organization founded in 2010 in Germany and based in Jerusalem that provides aid and rescue to Muslim communities in conflict zones.
The website does not list phone numbers for the office or its exact address. It says Al-Majd Europe works with various organizations including 15 international agencies, but no organization is listed and a “to be announced soon” message appeared in the section on Friday.
Another report that appeared on the site on Friday said people were impersonating her to ask for money or cryptocurrency “under the guise of facilitating travel or humanitarian aid.” Al-Majd Europe did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent to an email address listed on its website.
(With input from agencies)
