Zürcher Nachrichten - S.Africa says 'suspicious' flights from Israel show 'agenda to cleanse Palestinians'

The group landed in Johannesburg on a chartered flight on Thursday without departure stamps from Israel in their passports.

Reports said a shadowy organisation named Al-Majd was involved in their travel from Gaza.

"We are suspicious, as the South African government, about the circumstances surrounding the arrival of the plane," Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola told reporters.

South African border police kept the group on the plane for 12 hours before President Cyril Ramaphosa allowed them entry on a standard 90-day visa exemption.

It emerged later that a first plane carrying 176 Palestinians had arrived on October 28, according to the local Gift of the Givers charity that is assisting the arrivals.

"We do not want any further flights to come our way because this is a clear agenda to cleanse out Palestinians out of Gaza and the West Bank and those areas, which South Africa is against," Lamola said.

"It does look like it represents a broader agenda to remove Palestinians from Palestine into many different parts of the world, and is a clearly orchestrated operation," he said, without providing further details.

- Palestinians 'misled' -

South Africa, which is set to host world leaders at the G20 summit this weekend, is seen as one of the strongest supporters of the Palestinian cause.

Pretoria filed a case against Israel with the International Court of Justice in 2023, accusing it of genocide in Gaza.

The Gift of the Givers NGO told AFP the Palestinians it is assisting said they had paid around $2,000 per person to Al-Majd for the trip.

"What we've been told is that they were promised some type of travel out of Gaza to some form of safety in a country that would welcome them," representative Sarah Oosthuizen told AFP.

Some of the passengers appeared to have been misled about their final destination, with a few believing they were headed to Indonesia, Malaysia or India, she said.

Travellers in the first group -- which included men, women and children -- "definitely did not know that they were coming to South Africa", Oosthuizen said.

They flew from Israel's Ramon airport to Nairobi before boarding the chartered plane to Johannesburg, she said.

The accommodation promised on arrival turned out to have been booked for only up to a week and, "when they were settled in these accommodations, their contact with Al-Majd went silent," Oosthuizen said.

Some of the group had told the NGO that they wished to apply for asylum, she said.

- 'Investigating' -

The Palestinian embassy in South Africa said Thursday the travel of both groups "was arranged by an unregistered and misleading organisation that exploited the tragic humanitarian conditions of our people in Gaza".

The group had "deceived families, collected money from them, and facilitated their travel in an irregular and irresponsible manner", it said.

According to an activist from the pro-Palestinian Social Intifada civil society group in Johannesburg, the Palestinians said Al-Majd had advertised "evacuation and relocation" to people in Gaza on social media.

They were told to pay money into an account and to expect a day's notice before departure," Khalid Vawda told AFP.

"Once they met at the departure point, they were taken through the Kerem Shalom crossing, where whatever belongings they had, they had to leave behind. They were only allowed to take their mobile phones, the clothing they were wearing, and whatever cash they had on them," he said.

When AFP in Jerusalem tried to contact Al-Majd, none of the numbers listed on their website were in service. Their linked address only led to the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah.

Israeli authorities told AFP at the weekend that the 153 Palestinians had been allowed to leave Gaza after receiving "approval from a third country to receive them", without naming the country in question.

Lamola on Monday said Pretoria was investigating.

M.J.Baumann--NZN