BDS movement supported by PSA and other concerned activists including Pastor Nigel Branken held protests at Richards Bay harbour terminal on 16 My 2026 and also launched petitions, urging the government to stop exports to Israel, claiming that South African coal is “fuelling the genocide” in Palestine.

South Africa exported 1.8-million tons of coal to Israel in 2025.

PSA PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 14 MAY 2026

TÜRKIYE – Six members of the Global Sumud South Africa Delegation is part of the Global Sumud Flotilla as it regroups in Türkiye with more than 50 boats from multiple ports preparing to push toward Gaza in what has become the largest civilian maritime mission in history. The delegation comprises Qutb Hendricks, Yusuf Rahman, Mogamed Faeek Afriedien, Ambassador Faizel Moosa, Hajar Ahjum, Kagiso Mathee, and Ebrahim Peters.

Their presence on the water this week is not coincidental. On 15 May, the world marks 78 years of the Nakba, the Arabic word for ‘catastrophe’, which recalls the mass dispossession of Palestinians that began in 1948 when 15,000 Palestinians were massacred and more than 750,000 were ethnically cleansed from their homes. Some of those 1948 refugees were exiled to Gaza. Their status from their original home did not protect them, as they have remained besieged by the Zionist entity, more recently under a 19-year blockade. Ninety per cent of Gaza’s 1.9 million are displaced.