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South Africa’s foreign minister on Monday criticized the plane that brought more than 150 people into the country Palestinians As part of a “comprehensive agenda” to evacuate Gaza and west coast Through a network of chartered flights.
Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola did not say who South Africa believes organized the chartered plane that arrived in Johannesburg on Thursday with 153 Palestinians, but his comments were seen as incriminating israel Being behind the campaign to evacuate people from the Palestinian territories and send them to other countries.
“In fact, as a South African government, we are concerned about the arrival of the aircraft and the circumstances surrounding the passengers on board,” Lamola said. “It appears to represent a wider agenda of expelling Palestinians from Palestine to many different parts of the world and it is clearly a well-planned operation because they are not only being sent to South Africa. There are other countries where such flights have been sent.”
The Israeli authority responsible for implementing civilian policies in the Palestinian territories said the Palestinians left the Gaza Strip on a plane chartered to South Africa after receiving approval from a third country as part of the Israeli government’s policy of allowing Gaza residents to leave. The name of the third country was not mentioned in this.
Israel’s government earlier accepted a pledge by US President Donald Trump to permanently clear Gaza of more than 2 million Palestinians under a plan that rights groups said would amount to ethnic cleansing. At the time, Trump said he would not be allowed to return.
Trump has since backed away from that plan and called for a ceasefire between Israel and the terrorist group Hamas Which allows Palestinians to live in Gaza.
Israel discussed with South Sudan earlier this year the possibility of resettling Palestinians from Gaza there as part of a broader Israeli effort to facilitate mass migration from the region. It also launched resettlement schemes for Palestinians with other African governments.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said intelligence services would investigate who was behind the plane carrying Palestinians, which arrived at Johannesburg’s main OR Tambo International Airport from southern Israel’s Ramon airport via a stopover in Kenya.
“We don’t want any more flights coming our way because it has a clear agenda to get Palestinians out of Gaza and the West Bank,” Lamola said.
South African officials said the Palestinians – including a family with children and a woman who was nine months pregnant – did not have the correct documents to travel to South Africa or exit Israel. He was eventually allowed entry after being prevented from deboarding the plane by immigration officials and being held on the airport tarmac by South African authorities for almost 12 hours, which was strongly criticized by rights groups.
South Africa has long been a supporter of the Palestinians and a critic of Israel.
Lamola’s comments came after allegations were made by South African civil groups that the Jerusalem-based organization Al-Majd organized the charter for South Africa and has ties to Israel. The groups offered no evidence for their claims of Israeli ties.
An Israeli military official, speaking anonymously to discuss confidential information, said that al-Majd arranged the transport of about 150 Palestinians from Gaza to South Africa and obtained proper travel documents for them.
A South African NGO said the chartered plane that arrived in Johannesburg last week was the second in recent weeks after a flight from Israel landed with more than 170 Palestinians on October 28.
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