Unraveling the Mystery: Australian Connection to Palestinian Flight Sparks Panic in South Africa

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A group of Palestinian mothers and children have arrived in Australia after escaping Gaza via a controversial flight to South Africa, with an Australian family spokesman describing their “sheer panic” after being held on a Johannesburg tarmac for several hours.

Footage from inside the cabin shows men and women in distress while being held on the tarmac for 12 hours in sweltering conditions, as checks were conducted by South African authorities, which had said the Palestinians did not have departure stamps in their passports.

An intervention from a non-governmental organization (NGO) finally allowed the stranded individuals to disembark. Out of the group, 23 were able to travel to other countries, taking flights to destinations including Australia, Canada, and Malaysia, thanks to the visas they obtained.

SBS News understands a group of 11 women and children arrived in Australia on Friday on temporary visas that they had held since November 2023.

The Department of Home Affairs said it would not comment on individual matters due to privacy reasons.

“Exiting Gaza remains difficult and unpredictable,” a spokesperson told SBS News in a statement.

According to Australian immigration policy, “All non-citizens who wish to travel to, enter, or remain in Australia must meet all legal criteria, including identity, health, character, and security requirements.”

Amid the dire circumstances during the famine in Gaza, the individuals described being so weakened that walking became a struggle. They recounted experiencing severe exhaustion and hunger, often seeing double due to their debilitated state.

Australian-Palestinian woman Raneem Emad told SBS News her two aunts and their children were among those who arrived on Friday.

She said some require urgent medical attention after surviving a 2023 Israeli airstrike on a popular Gaza restaurant. The husband of one aunt was killed in the strike, she said.

“My auntie and her children were under the rubble for hours before Palestinian civil defence workers were able to pull them out,” Raneem said.

“My auntie … had a concussion that hasn’t been treated for over a year now, and my eldest cousin who injured her arm pretty badly, she can’t write with that arm, and also had shrapnel caught in her lungs, which has affected her breathing.”

The moment of reunion was described as “very, very bittersweet” by those involved. While the individuals had endured significant hardships, the relief of finally having them back safely was profoundly moving.

In a twist of events, these individuals from Gaza somehow found themselves on a flight that made a stopover in Nairobi before reaching their destination, a journey described as mysterious by one observer.

A spokeswoman for Palestine Australia Relief and Action (PARA), a charity assisting the group in Australia, said the group had undergone extensive security checks and were cleared by both Israeli and Australian authorities. Additional checks were done while they were in Johannesburg, she said.

“The level of scrutiny being applied to this cohort, this group of people is unparalleled,” the spokeswoman told SBS News.

Raneem said her family was able to flee Gaza after they learned in June about an organisation called Al-Majd Europe offering people the chance to leave. Palestinians have been unable to leave Gaza during the course of the war as the borders have been closed by Israel and Egypt.

“The individual who specifically told her (about it) had said, ‘Don’t worry, only people with visas are being allowed to leave through this way. So it’s very trustworthy. It’s very safe’.”

After waiting months for the opportunity, the family crossed through the Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing and onto a flight “not knowing what country” they’d be sent to, Raneem said.

“At that country they (were told) they would be booked accommodation for a week before they would then be allowed to travel to wherever their final destination was, being Australia.”

Raneem said she received a panicked call from her cousins when the family arrived in South Africa and began conversing with authorities.

“(She was) freaking out, saying, ‘I’m trying to tell them we have Australian visas. They said they don’t care. They will not let us off this plane’.

“They were being threatened that the plane was going to be sent back to Cairo, and then they were going to have to be forced to reenter Gaza.

“It was just sheer panic and sheer terror.”

Raneem said the family was relieved when they were allowed to leave the plane and then, finally arrive in Australia.

“It was very, very bittersweet, because they had been obviously through so much, but just being able to have them within our grasp again, was very beautiful.”

Mystery surrounds organisation behind departure

The flight generated controversy after South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said it seemed like the Palestinians “were being flushed out”.

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

The Israeli body that runs civil affairs in the Palestinian territories, COGAT, said the group had only been allowed to leave Gaza after COGAT “received approval from a third country to receive them”, without naming the country.

In May, Reuters reported that Israel had eased restrictions on Palestinians leaving Gaza, and that around 1,000 of them had been bussed out of the enclave to board flights to Europe and elsewhere. The departures required a request to Israel by a foreign government.

Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that Al-Majd, which described itself on its website as a humanitarian organisation “providing aid and rescue efforts to Muslim communities in conflict and war zones”, was run by a dual Israeli-Estonian national.

Haaretz also revealed that Al-Majd was referred by Israeli Defense Ministry’s Voluntary Emigration Bureau, to coordinate the Palestinians’ departures with the Israeli army’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT).

South African Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola also raised concerns, saying the government was “suspicious” about the circumstances surrounding the arrival of the plane.

“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.

Asked about Lamola’s comments, an Israeli government spokesperson said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had “made it clear that if Palestinians want to leave, they should be allowed to leave the Gaza Strip. And if they want to come back to the Gaza Strip, they should also be allowed to come back”.

Raneem said her family had “no choice” but to use Al Majd as it was their only way out. She said her family did not know about the background of the organisation because their immediate priority was safety.

She said their decision to leave their homeland was also difficult.

“They’ve come to the point of desperation between … a choice of death or displacement,” Raneem said.

“It’s not a voluntary flight or holiday that they’re making, (or) a relocation for a job.

“This is them making that brutal decision of, ‘We don’t know what the future holds in Gaza. We love our country, we love our people, but it looks like this is what is being afforded to us’.”

‘I had to leave for cancer treatment’

Palestinians who spoke to Reuters said they received messages from Al-Majd Europe via WhatsApp telling them security clearances had been granted. They left Gaza on buses and were taken through the Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing before being flown out of Ramon airport. They arrived in South Africa on November 13.

One man, Ramzi Abu Youssef left with his wife and three children, aged 8, 10, and 12, and said two of his daughters had been killed in an Israeli attack in June 2024 during a raid on Nuseirat camp, where his house had been destroyed.

“I am a lymphoma cancer patient. How long would I have had to wait to be evacuated … I had to leave for treatment and for a better life for my family,” the 42-year-old told Reuters by phone from Johannesburg.

Another Palestinian, who asked to remain anonymous due to concerns about his security and upsetting his new hosts, said his family reluctantly decided to leave Gaza after living through months of bombardment and being forced to evacuate his home in Deir al-Balah several times. Aged 35, he left with his wife and two children, a four-year-old boy and a two-year-old girl.

— With additional reporting by Reuters news agency.