- Immigrant Times
- Nov 26, 2025
- 4 min read
An opaque organisation flies desperate Palestinians out of Gaza
Investigations by international media organisations report that Al-Majd Europe, a little-known outfit, has arranged chartered departures from Gaza via Israel, sometimes charging thousands and leaving passengers unsure where they were being flown.
An Immigrant Times’ review of international reporting *
A plane chartered in Romania took 153 Gaza Palestinians from Israel’s Ramon airport to Johannesburg in South Africa (Photo: Gift of the Givers)
November 2025: Over recent months, major outlets including the Financial Times, Haaretz, Reuters, The Wall Street Journal and Al Jazeera have pieced together a picture of a private operation that has quietly transported hundreds of Palestinians out of Gaza on chartered flights. The journeys have carried desperate civilians through Israeli territory and onward to countries such as South Africa, Kenya, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Almost every step of the process appears irregular.
Yet for many Gazans, the opaque routes run by a little-known organisation, calling itself Al-Majd Europe, may have been the only available escape from a territory battered by war and near-total economic collapse.
A market for desperate Palestinians wanting to leave Gaza
For months, the prospect of leaving Gaza legally was vanishingly small. Egypt’s Rafah crossing, once the principal exit for civilians, has frequently been sealed. Israeli permissions have been limited to a small number of medical evacuations and family reunification cases.
Into that vacuum stepped Al-Majd Europe, a name previously unfamiliar to humanitarian workers, airlines, and government officials, until it emerged in the testimony of passengers and in investigations by reporters.
According to the Financial Times, the group advertised online for applicants seeking to leave Gaza and collected payments ranging from roughly $1,500 to more than $5,000 per person. Several passengers told reporters they were asked to pay in cryptocurrency or cash, with coordinators claiming the funds were needed to secure movement through Israeli checkpoints and cover charter flight costs.
For families trapped amid shortages, bombardment, and the collapse of civil infrastructure, these sums were astronomical. But some saw no other option. “I wasn’t told where we were going,” one passenger told Reuters after landing in South Africa. “I paid because I needed to get my children out of there.”
The mysterious organisation behind the flights
Who exactly runs Al-Majd Europe remains unclear. Haaretz reported that the group is connected to a small Estonian-registered company whose listed owner also holds Israeli citizenship. According to that investigation, the company arranged buses for Palestinian passengers to cross from Gaza into southern Israel, from where they were brought to Ramon Airport.
Other outlets have described the operation’s corporate footprint as minimal, inconsistent, or opaque. Al-Majd Europe’s public statements have offered little clarity. At various points, the group has portrayed itself as a humanitarian actor and an evacuation broker. But it has not explained its funding, staffing, or political affiliations.
Some Palestinian officials and analysts interviewed by the media expressed concerns about the implications of such flights, particularly if they were conducted without complete documentation, transparency, and clear assurances that passengers were not being pressured to leave.
Al-Majd Europe has denied accusations that it is facilitating forced migration, but has provided no verifiable explanation of its structure or oversight.
Unexpectedly, a plane lands in South Africa
The irregular nature of the operation became an international story in November, when a Romanian-chartered plane carrying more than 150 Palestinians from Gaza landed in South Africa.
According to Reuters and local reporting cited widely, South African authorities were not notified in advance in the usual manner. Some passengers reportedly lacked standard Israeli exit stamps; many held only temporary tourist visas. Officials in Pretoria announced investigations almost immediately.
Inside South Africa, the arrival sparked debate. Were government departments bypassed? Who had authorised the landing? And why had passengers been sent to Johannesburg without the standard documentation expected for international arrivals?
Interviews collected by the Financial Times and Al Jazeera paint a complex picture. Some passengers described the operation as their only lifeline. Others said the process felt clandestine, with little communication, hurried border transfers, and uncertainty about whether the route was even legal.
There is no evidence to date that passengers were physically coerced onto the flights. But many human-rights advocates say that coercion can also take subtler forms. When a civilian has no safe home, no food security, no functioning hospital, and no reliable exit, the choice to pay a private broker may be one born of desperation, not agency.
International legal experts quoted in various reports warn that states must ensure civilians from conflict zones are not removed under conditions that could be construed as forced displacement, especially when the brokers involved are private, unregulated, or potentially acting with unknown political interests.
What governments knew, and what they didn’t
Reporting so far suggests that Israeli authorities were aware that Palestinians were being transported through their territory toward outbound flights. Some outlets reported that Israeli agencies inspected buses or passengers along the route. But the degree of coordination, whether formal or ad hoc, remains a subject of contested reporting.
What is clear is that countries receiving the flights, particularly South Africa, were not always briefed in advance. That absence of prior notice is unusual for charter flights carrying civilians from a conflict zone.
Malaysia and Indonesia, which received earlier flights, have not released detailed public statements, though local media in those countries quoted officials confirming arrivals and processing them under standard immigration categories.
* Sources
• Financial Times, The brokers offering to spirit Palestinians from Gaza (November 2025).
• Haaretz, Shadowy firm run by an Israeli-Estonian has gotten hundreds of Palestinians out of Gaza (16 November 2025).
• Reuters, Gazans say they paid $2,000 per seat for flight to South Africa (17 November 2025).
• Al Jazeera, Man says shadowy group sending Palestinians out of Gaza has Israeli support (16 November 2025) and follow-ups.
• The Wall Street Journal, Inside the Israeli-Linked Flights Carrying Palestinians Out … (18 November 2025).
• Ynet, El País, Majalla and others reporting on the same events.
Further reading: Refugees from Gaza are not welcome ||
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