Best of 2025: Tim Flack - How facts were lost when 100 Gazans quietly flew into SA

Over 100 Gazans arrived at OR Tambo in a lawful, coordinated exit from Gaza, yet South African social media and officials spun a false crisis story. This investigation exposes how misinformation, NGO influence, and administrative confusion turned routine travel into political spectacle, obscuring the truth behind a structured humanitarian movement..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..By Tim Flack.Arrival at OR Tambo On a warm Thursday morning in Johannesburg, while commuters were inching along the N12, a Global Aviation aircraft rolled to a stop at OR Tambo International Airport. The doors stayed shut. Instead of disembarking, just over one hundred Gazans remained seated as South African immigration officials boarded the plane to verify each person inside. It was an unusual scene. A sealed aircraft, a full passenger list held in place, and officials trying to understand who these individuals were and how they had arrived.The instant online narrativeBefore the verification had even begun, a completely different story erupted online. South African social media commentators loudly declared that these passengers were refugees abandoned by Israel because their passports had not been stamped. Activists and NGOs repeated the claim with remarkable confidence. Within hours, a single narrative had settled in: Israel had stranded them, and this incident somehow served as fresh proof of ethnic cleansing and genocide. The volume of repetition replaced factual understanding. What Gazans said: The real story emergesNone of those pushing this narrative knew who these travellers were or why they were in South Africa. The actual explanations came from Arabic-language Social media groups used by Gazans. As the plane sat on the tarmac, family members and neighbours posted clarifications and shared their experiences.They described a structured exit process managed through Al-Majd Europe. Applicants register online, wait for confirmation, then pay between $1700 and $2000. Local intermediaries in Gaza help gather documents. Names are submitted to the Israeli coordination office, and applicants wait for Israel to approve them. Once clearance comes through, Al-Majd gives final instructions and arranges the movement to Ramon Airport inside Israel. The accounts were consistent. They showed a lawful, predictable pathway that ordinary Gazans knew existed. Most importantly, they made it clear these individuals wanted to leave Gaza.This was not the South African story. It was the product of a ceasefire framework and an organised, voluntary exit mechanism. The Gazans paid for this process to exercise their own choice, not because of any sudden emergency or abandonment. How the exit pipeline actually worksInside Gaza, the mechanism functions quietly. Applicants begin with online registration through Al-Majd Europe. Their documentation is collected through intermediaries embedded in everyday institutions such as civil offices and Al-Aqsa Hospital. At the hospital, it is often cleaners or administrative staff who guide applicants toward the correct internal contacts.Once registration is complete, Al-Majd places the applicant into the coordination queue and advises them of the fee. After payment, the details go to the Israeli coordination office for vetting. Israel confirms identities, conducts security assessments, and verifies the stated purpose of travel. Nothing moves forward without Israeli approval.When approval is granted, applicants receive instructions and are transported out of Gaza, through Israeli-controlled checkpoints, and to Ramon Airport. The departure is processed in Israel, and only then does the onward journey begin. The entire chain depends on Israeli authorisation and coordination at every stage. The ceasefire framework that made this possibleThe Sharam El-Sheikh agreement, negotiated earlier this year, forms the foundation of this entire mechanism. It was concluded between the United States, Egypt, Qatar, and Turkey, with over twenty states participating in the broader framework. It established a structured process allowing Gazans to leave voluntarily and safely, with Israel responsible for operational coordination in partnership with these international actors.South Africa had no role in this framework. The Palestinian Authority did not implement or administer it either, even though Mahmoud Abbas and senior PA officials attended the summit and were aware of the voluntary exit provisions. Their absence in South Africa’s information chain stems not from exclusion, but from the fact that they were not operational participants. They simply never conveyed this information to Pretoria. Why the South African narrative collapsedSouth African commentators claimed Israel had blocked or abandoned the travellers. This is impossible when Israel is the state actor that approved, vetted, and physically enabled their departure. Hamas refuses to let its population leave. Israel permitted it. COGAT publicly confirms the exit mechanismsIsrael’s Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) publicly affirmed the broader exit mechanisms operating out of Gaza, reinforcing exactly what Gazans themselves described. On 13 November, COGAT released an official statement confirming that close to 250 Gazans in need of medical treatment, along with caregivers and dual citizenship holders, exited Gaza through the coordinated crossings at Kerem Shalom, theAllenby Bridge, and the Ramon Airport. They highlighted that these movements form part of an ongoing, internationally supported pathway.COGAT emphasised that Israel continues to work with global partners to facilitate the safe medical evacuation of civilians. This aligns directly with the structured, vetted, and internationally coordinated process that enabled the group to reach South Africa. It also demonstrates that the movement of Gazans out of Gaza is neither sudden nor mysterious. It is part of an established humanitarian and administrative system that Israel manages transparently and routinely in partnership with other states.This public confirmation stands in stark contrast to the claims circulated in South Africa. Far from blocking travellers or abandoning them, Israel was actively enabling the secure passage of civilians through the very same mechanism. The social-media narrative in South Africa ignored Israel’s documented role in approving, coordinating, and securing these movements. COGAT’s statement reinforces the factual reality: these were organised, lawful exits conducted through official channels with clear humanitarian purpose and international oversight..The Ramon to Nairobi route From Ramon Airport, the group was routed through Nairobi as a routine logistical connection. Global Aviation Flight 901 left Johannesburg on 12 November, landed in Nairobi,and returned early on the 13th carrying the Gazan travellers. Kenya did not stamp their passports because they were in transit. Israel did not stamp passports because Israel discontinued passport stamping years ago to protect travellers from discrimination in countries that penalise entry from Israel. Instead, Israel issues electronic entry cards.These are standard international practices. Flight records confirm the exact timings. How Technical Facts Became Political AccusationsInside South Africa, these ordinary travel procedures were twisted into accusations. Gift of the Givers publicly claimed Israel had refused to stamp passports. Activists echoed the claim. Officials wandered into the same messaging. The details of transit procedures were discarded and replaced with a narrative that matched domestic political agendas. What really happened on the groundThe scene inside OR Tambo was far less dramatic than the online version, but the handling was deeply flawed. Immigration officers attempted to verify identities and travel histories while passengers sat on the grounded aircraft for hours without proper food, water, or ventilation. Children and a heavily pregnant woman became distressed. This was not a crisis caused by Israel. It was the result of South Africa’s own administrative disorganisation and confusion.Throughout the day, officials issued contradictory statements. By the time the travellers were allowed to disembark, the country had already been swept up in a completely false narrative.Gift of the Givers’ Opportunistic Intervention and the Distortion of State ResponseGift of the Givers had no role in organising any part of this movement. They did not arrange the exit, the coordination, the transit, or the aircraft. They only appeared once the plane had already landed.Yet a single call from Imtiaz Sooliman triggered a rapid shift inside government. DIRCO, the Presidency, and various spokespeople aligned their messaging with his public statements, despite those statements being factually wrong and based on a misunderstanding or deliberate reframing of the process.This exposed a significant weakness in South Africa’s governance. Officials relied on the narrative of one unelected NGO figure rather than verified intelligence. It raises serious questions about how one individual can influence policy posture across multiple departments in a single phone call, what precedent this sets for crisis management, and why the government appears more responsive to a public personality than to its own information networks.This was not humanitarian leadership. It was institutional fragility. At least one previous Ramon movement passed through the same route quietly, unnoticed by both the government and Gift of the Givers. The issue was South Africa’s lack of information, not Israel’s actions.South Africans deserve a state grounded in facts, not a state that adopts unverified narrative as official doctrine. The human realityStrip away the noise. These travellers were ordinary people who made a voluntary decision to leave Gaza through a lawful mechanism. Their movement was structured, coordinated, and authorised under an international framework that South Africans had never been told about. That silence allowed others to turn human lives into political theatre. The tragedy behind the noiseThe tragedy was never their arrival. The tragedy was how quickly South Africa turned a routine movement into a spectacle engineered for outrage. A lawful exit pipeline was repackaged as crisis. Facts gave way to slogans.By the time the truth emerges, the damage will have taken hold. South Africans were fed a story that bore no resemblance to the actual process. A vacuum of transparency allowed misinformation to flourish. Beyond the misinformationThis episode reveals a deeper structural problem. South Africa’s political environment is so vulnerable to reactive storytelling that a single influential voice can override due process and distort public understanding. Officials responded to headlines, not facts. Institutions deferred to NGO messaging instead of international documentation.The result was predictable confusion and administrative paralysis.This was not a humanitarian emergency. It was a failure of state competence. Final ReflectionThe Ramon Corridor exposed how easily national understanding can be shaped by those who speak the loudest rather than those who know the facts. It revealed a government that can be swayed by public personalities more quickly than by verified intelligence. And it showed how misinformation becomes policy when truth is treated as optional.This investigation returns the facts to the centre. It cuts through the distortion and lays out what actually happened: how these individuals left Gaza, how they reached South Africa, and how their story was rewritten by those who never understood it.They deserved better. So did the public. This report ensures they finally receive the truth.