Latest news with #whitegenocide
News24
01-08-2025
- Business
- News24
‘Thousands of jobs now at risk, billions will be lost' – SA faces ‘crippling blow' from US tariffs
US President Donald Trump holds up an article propagating the myth of 'white genocide' from right-wing publication American Thinker during President Cyril Ramaphosa's visit to the Oval Office on 21 May. The US president has issued a blanket 30% tariff on all South African goods entering the US.
The Guardian
28-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
‘We are privileged': liberal Afrikaners reject Trump's ‘white genocide' claims
For some white Afrikaner South Africans, Donald Trump's offer of refugee status in the US has been seen as a godsend. For others, it has provoked anger and frustration that they are being falsely portrayed as victims of a 'white genocide', 31 years after their community's own oppressive minority rule ended. In February, Trump signed an executive order claiming Afrikaners, who make up about 4% of South Africa's population, or about 2.5 million people, were victims of 'unjust racial discrimination'. The order cut aid to the country and established a refugee programme for white South Africans. The first group arrived in May. Afrikaners, descendants of Dutch colonisers and French Huguenot refugees who came to South Africa in the late 17th century, implemented apartheid from 1948. The regime violently repressed the black majority, while keeping white people safe and wealthy. South Africa remains deeply unequal. White South Africans typically have 20 times the wealth of Black people, according to an article in the Review of Political Economy. The spectacle of white people being flown to the US while Trump blocked refugees from war zones bemused and angered South Africans of all races. For some liberal Afrikaners, it felt personal. 'In terms of being singled out, for progressives it's extremely painful,' said Lindie Koorts, a history lecturer at the University of Pretoria. Koorts mentioned the phrase 'ons is nie almal so nie' ('we are not all like that'). She said the phrase is used by progressives to reach out across South Africa's divides without disavowing their Afrikaner or South African identities – despite it having become a cliche that conservative Afrikaners use to mock them. The rightwing Solidarity Movement, which includes a trade union and the campaigning group AfriForum, has lobbied Trump since his first presidential term for support in helping Afrikaners stay in South Africa, to preserve what Solidarity Movement says is a culture under threat. The group argues, for instance, that a recently implemented education law will limit Afrikaans schooling, something the ruling African National Congress disputes. There is not comprehensive polling data on Afrikaners' political views. However, the Freedom Front Plus party, which is seen as representing conservative Afrikaners, received about 456,000 votes in the 2024 national elections. Emile Myburgh, a lawyer who grew up during apartheid believing that Afrikaners were God's chosen people, said: 'I remember when I was a child often hearing Afrikaners say that: 'The one who rules the tip of Africa rules the world.' So we'd feel very special.' Sign up to Headlines US Get the most important US headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion As an atheist, Myburgh, 52, said he now felt excluded from the deeply religious community he grew up in. However, he disputed the claim that his culture was under threat, noting that he regularly attended Afrikaans book launches. 'In the circles that I move in, we do celebrate Afrikaans culture,' he said. Zahria van Niekerk, a 22-year-old fashion student, who was raised bilingually to help her get into university, disagreed that the Afrikaans language, of whom the majority of speakers are now non-white, was threatened. 'My whole family speaks Afrikaans … As long as I can speak it with my family, I'm not really concerned.' In May, Trump ambushed South Africa's president, Cyril Ramaphosa, in the Oval Office with claims that white farmers were being murdered for their race. However, Emil van Maltitz, an economics graduate and farmer's son, disagreed. The 21-year-old, who speaks Sesotho, Afrikaans and English, said: 'Most farmers are white Afrikaners, so it can easily be interpreted as racial targeting. I just think, personally, people are very vulnerable in those areas and they don't have a lot of help from the police.' In the last quarter of 2024, South African police recorded 12 murders on farms, including Black-owned smallholder plots, out of almost 7,000 murders across the country. Van Maltitz recalled young black farmers coming to his father to seek agricultural advice, saying it showed the value of South Africans working together. 'I love diversity, I love being around different people,' he said. Schalk van Heerden is a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church, the largest Afrikaans church. He joked that he was a 'missionary' within the DRC, which supported the apartheid regime. Van Heerden co-founded Betereinders in 2017 to bring about 50 to 100 Afrikaners to monthly brais (barbecues) with up to 200 black people in townships, where most black South Africans still live. Betereinders means 'better-enders' and is a pun on 'bittereinders' ('bitter-enders'), Afrikaners who refused to surrender to the British when their side lost the Boer war. When Trump introduced the refugee scheme for Afrikaners, Beterenders put up 10 billboards around Johannesburg and Pretoria saying, 'Not USA. You, SA.' Van Heerden said: 'We want to be proud about who we are … [But] we are not the big victims in this story. We are privileged, we are very grateful and we are thankful for everything we have.'
The Guardian
28-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
‘We are privileged': liberal Afrikaners reject Trump's ‘white genocide' claims
For some white Afrikaner South Africans, Donald Trump's offer of refugee status in the US has been seen as a godsend. For others, it has provoked anger and frustration that they are being falsely portrayed as victims of a 'white genocide', 31 years after their community's own oppressive minority rule ended. In February, Trump signed an executive order claiming Afrikaners, who make up about 4% of South Africa's population, or about 2.5 million people, were victims of 'unjust racial discrimination'. The order cut aid to the country and established a refugee programme for white South Africans. The first group arrived in May. Afrikaners, descendants of Dutch colonisers and French Huguenot refugees who came to South Africa in the late 17th century, implemented apartheid from 1948. The regime violently repressed the black majority, while keeping white people safe and wealthy. South Africa remains deeply unequal. White South Africans typically have 20 times the wealth of Black people, according to an article in the Review of Political Economy. The spectacle of white people being flown to the US while Trump blocked refugees from war zones bemused and angered South Africans of all races. For some liberal Afrikaners, it felt personal. 'In terms of being singled out, for progressives it's extremely painful,' said Lindie Koorts, a history lecturer at the University of Pretoria. Koorts mentioned the phrase 'ons is nie almal so nie' ('we are not all like that'). She said the phrase is used by progressives to reach out across South Africa's divides without disavowing their Afrikaner or South African identities – despite it having become a cliche that conservative Afrikaners use to mock them. The rightwing Solidarity Movement, which includes a trade union and the campaigning group AfriForum, has lobbied Trump since his first presidential term for support in helping Afrikaners stay in South Africa, to preserve what Solidarity Movement says is a culture under threat. The group argues, for instance, that a recently implemented education law will limit Afrikaans schooling, something the ruling African National Congress disputes. There is not comprehensive polling data on Afrikaners' political views. However, the Freedom Front Plus party, which is seen as representing conservative Afrikaners, received about 456,000 votes in the 2024 national elections. Emile Myburgh, a lawyer who grew up during apartheid believing that Afrikaners were God's chosen people, said: 'I remember when I was a child often hearing Afrikaners say that: 'The one who rules the tip of Africa rules the world.' So we'd feel very special.' Sign up to Headlines US Get the most important US headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion As an atheist, Myburgh, 52, said he now felt excluded from the deeply religious community he grew up in. However, he disputed the claim that his culture was under threat, noting that he regularly attended Afrikaans book launches. 'In the circles that I move in, we do celebrate Afrikaans culture,' he said. Zahria van Niekerk, a 22-year-old fashion student, who was raised bilingually to help her get into university, disagreed that the Afrikaans language, of whom the majority of speakers are now non-white, was threatened. 'My whole family speaks Afrikaans … As long as I can speak it with my family, I'm not really concerned.' In May, Trump ambushed South Africa's president, Cyril Ramaphosa, in the Oval Office with claims that white farmers were being murdered for their race. However, Emil van Maltitz, an economics graduate and farmer's son, disagreed. The 21-year-old, who speaks Sesotho, Afrikaans and English, said: 'Most farmers are white Afrikaners, so it can easily be interpreted as racial targeting. I just think, personally, people are very vulnerable in those areas and they don't have a lot of help from the police.' In the last quarter of 2024, South African police recorded 12 murders on farms, including Black-owned smallholder plots, out of almost 7,000 murders across the country. Van Maltitz recalled young black farmers coming to his father to seek agricultural advice, saying it showed the value of South Africans working together. 'I love diversity, I love being around different people,' he said. Schalk van Heerden is a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church, the largest Afrikaans church. He joked that he was a 'missionary' within the DRC, which supported the apartheid regime. Van Heerden co-founded Betereinders in 2017 to bring about 50 to 100 Afrikaners to monthly brais (barbecues) with up to 200 black people in townships, where most black South Africans still live. Betereinders means 'better-enders' and is a pun on 'bittereinders' ('bitter-enders'), Afrikaners who refused to surrender to the British when their side lost the Boer war. When Trump introduced the refugee scheme for Afrikaners, Beterenders put up 10 billboards around Johannesburg and Pretoria saying, 'Not USA. You, SA.' Van Heerden said: 'We want to be proud about who we are … [But] we are not the big victims in this story. We are privileged, we are very grateful and we are thankful for everything we have.'
Mail & Guardian
02-06-2025
- General
- Mail & Guardian
‘Trump was misled on white genocide claims,' says his adviser, Mike Burns
US President Donald Trump. (File photo by Seth Wenig-Pool/Getty Images) African American televangelist Mike Burns, in an interview with the Mail & Guardian, challenged the 'white genocide' narrative about South Africa and decried the country's foreign policy ambivalence towards the dollar. He is a minister of Harvest Worship Center in South Carolina and a Republican who ran for state governor. He served as a board member of Pastors for Trump. An early supporter of Donald Trump in 2016, Time magazine named Burns one of the US president's top advisers. Burns' visit to South Africa follows months of strained relations between South Africa and the United States, which culminated in M&G: What has been your experience of South Africa thus far? Burns: 'I've been to Africa many times, the continent, first time ever in South Africa. I feel like I'm in America. I'm going to be honest with you. There's so many similarities. From architecture to your transportation, your roads, your highways. Literally, I'm thinking I'm back at home in South Carolina, with the exception that we drive on different sides of the roads.' M&G: In terms of the religious situation in South Africa and churches, and also the political scene, how are you finding it? Mike Burns: 'Obviously, the elephant in the room is the conversation with your president [Cyril Ramaphosa] and my president [Donald Trump] in the Oval Office; how there's been a conversation or a belief system that there is a white genocide that is happening in South Africa and that white farmers are being targeted and having their land stolen. Just based on the conversations that I've been having with Afrikaners and black, coloured, Asian South Africans, I'm shocked to discover that most, not all of them, are shocked to believe that was something that was even spoken about in their country.' M&G: Do you think the personal experience of President Trump possibly being here in South Africa might change his opinion on white genocide? Mike Burns: 'Well, absolutely. I mean, again, President Trump is a man of peace. His goal is to bring peace and bring prosperity to all nations. That's why he is doing things that traditional presidents didn't do, like talk with Iran, like have conversations with Syria … Maybe [white genocide] is absolutely true because [media] are presenting evidence that we don't know the truth of. We just know what's been shown to us and that these white farmers who are here in the United States of America in fear of their life are being hunted down by black people. And so if that's true, as a black man, I stand on what's right and not what's popular.' M&G: What were some of the key takeaways from your conversations with members of the Afrikaner community? Mike Burns: 'There's a crime problem. Out of the 5,200 and so murders that took place in the last quarter of 2024, 12 of them were farmers. Out of those 12, only three of them were white. And so this is the realistic numbers that are coming from white Afrikaners who are here in South Africa and represent 70% of the farms. I just had a wonderful meeting with them, and I'm getting all this new information first hand from leaders who, again, are white. If I was in a room full of black folks, I would probably say, you know what? You're probably painting a different narrative to make yourself look innocent. […] Do they want more protection from legal law enforcement officers? Absolutely. Do they believe that there's a crime problem? Absolutely. Do they believe that they themselves are endangered because they're a white farmer? No, they do not.' M&G: With in November, how can these two presidents, with Ramaphosa preferring quiet diplomacy and Trump's confrontational style, find each other among the issues they differ on — from Israel and Palestine, Ukraine and Russia, and the tariffs? Mike Burns: 'Well, I can tell you, just to clarify, you know, the Palestinian-Israeli War and the Ukrainian-Russian War are not United States wars, let's be clear. I understand that the president and the United States carry significant weight, but these are not President Trump's wars. President Trump has inherited these conflicts. You mentioned his brash personality. That's why America voted for him so overwhelmingly, because we're tired of being taken advantage of by the rest of the world. It's the United States versus the rest of the world. And I think your president could do what he did earlier [at the White House], continue to ask the president to come and play golf, come to the G20, come to South Africa, see for yourself. But again, a challenge, and I could just say this, a challenge is Brics. M&G: Please expand on the Brics issue? Mike Burns: 'I understand that some are under the opinion that Brics carries little teeth or little weight, but to understand Brics symbolises Brazil, Russia, India, China and the s symbolises South Africa. And for these organisations, these governments to come together, with the ideal, whether it's strong or weak, M&G: Do you see President Trump attending the G20 summit in November? Mike Burns: 'I can't speak for him. He'll speak for himself. But if it was up to me, I would advise the president to come to the G20 … And the president is a smart and wise individual that when receiving the right information, he begins to question the validity of information that was given to him the first time.'
Daily Mail
29-05-2025
- General
- Daily Mail
Alleged killer of Jewish diplomats was obsessed with whites and and white genocide, leaked texts reveal
The accused killer of two Jewish diplomats was obsessed with white people and white genocide. Elias Rodriguez said in text messages to friends that 'you probably would have to actually genocide white people to make this a normal country.' 'Like even a very targeted and selective rehabilitation program would probably have to lead to the lifetime imprisonments of tens of millions of white people,' he went on. The messages - posted a week after the couple were shot dead in Washington DC - were obtained by journalist Ken Klippenstein. Rodriguez, a 31-year-old Chicago native, was arrested on May 21 after he allegedly opened fire on Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrime 21 times outside the Capital Jewish Museum. He has been charged with two counts of first-degree murder. The couple, who were set to get engaged just a week from their deaths, had attended a Young Diplomats event before they were shot that night. During his arrest, Rodriguez was hysterically hauled away while shouting: 'Free, free Palestine,' as he squirmed against an officers' grip. Now, a week after the senseless attack, text messages sent in a group chat from Rodriguez revealed his disturbing obsession with the specific demographic. 'Lol you probably would have to actually genocide white people to make this a normal country,' Rodriguez wrote to friends in a group chat. 'Like even a very targeted and selective rehabilitation program would probably have to lead to the lifetime imprisonments of tens of millions of white people,' he went on. White genocide is a conspiracy theory that claims there is a deliberate plot to cause mass extinction of white people through violence, immigration, and forced assimilation. Friends of the alleged killer claim he 'never, ever said anything remotely racist about Jews or anyone.' But he harbored a strong hatred of Israel, they contend. 'He was a big proponent of "the emerging resistance axis" of Russia, Iran, Hezbollah, Assad's Syria,' one claimed. 'He seemed pretty vocally in favor of Hamas for years — way before 2023,' the pals added. 'He'd always hated Israel and would call it "The Little Satan." ' In other messages to his peers, Rodriguez professed his sadness over the murders of two prominent Hamas leaders - Hassan Nasrallah and Yahya Sinwar. 'Honestly I'm still just feeling sad about the murder of Hassan Nasrallah,' Rodriguez wrote. 'It hurts when people are killed specifically for doing what's right, when so many are afraid to…' After the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) released a video of the killing of Sinwar - the former chairman of the Hamas Political Bureau - he told the chat: '100% him sadly.' During his arrest, Rodriguez also expressed praise for Aaron Bushnell, the U.S. airman who set himself on fire outside the Israel Embassy - where Lischinsky and Milgrime worked. 'Just now saw the unblurred video and lost it,' Rodriguez told the group in reference to the horrific video of Bushnell setting himself ablaze. Although his messages did not appear to mention anything about murder, Rodriguez's friends told Klippenstein he seemed nicer in the weeks just before. Only one post by Rodriguez revealed what he did the day before the shooting. He told his friends that he met and shook the hand of Rod Blagojevich, the former governor of Illinois who was impeached and convicted for public corruption. After being behind bars for nearly eight years, Blagojevich was pardoned by President Donald Trump earlier this year. When a friend replied, asking if Blagojevich was the ambassador to Serbia, Rodriguez responded: 'Lmao is he? ' After reading a link to an article stating that Trump had considered Blagojevich for the position, Rodriguez added: 'Hilarious.' Meanwhile, has revealed that Rodriguez has a live-in girlfriend. The 'manifesto' he allegedly wrote the day before the killings ended with the words 'I love you Mom, Dad, baby sis, the rest of my familia, including you, O*****.' Rodriguez and the woman – who is believed to have the last name Oliver – moved into a modest Chicago apartment two years ago. The exact number of asterisks were used to match the remaining letters in the name Oliver in the screed about the plight of Palestinians in Gaza. Neighbor John Fry, 71, said Rodriguez's girlfriend mysteriously vanished shortly before the fatal shooting. 'There was a young woman, although I haven't seen her for a couple of weeks now,' Fry added. 'I can't say exactly when she left.' 'I'm guessing she was in her late 20s, about 5ft 3in tall, dark hair. Nothing special about her build. Difficult to really describe her much after that. 'I don't know why she apparently hasn't been around.' 'They were a really quiet couple. Although in these apartment buildings people only tend to just say "hi" to each other, not much more than that,' said Fry. 'I didn't exchange that many words with her.' The shocking double slaying was far from the first time Israeli foreign hubs have been targeted by terrorists. Since 1969, there have been at least 31 terrorist attacks on Israeli embassies or diplomatic staffers around the world, according to Fox News. The murders came amid rising global protests over Israel's treatment of civilians in Gaza.
