Dear friends,
I know it is not easy to be you at this moment in world history.
South Africa has been accused of carrying out genocide against our white population. This narrative was created and brought to the White House by a small group of white extremists.
I arrived in the US for a short visit in the days preceding the arrival of the South African president.
Though I have visited the US countless times in the past 30+ years, friends and colleagues were nervous as to whether “the land of the brave and home of the free” would let me in. I was sufficiently paranoid that I removed my Facebook from my phone. So much for the First Amendment.
Your media has been filled with the recent encounter between our president and yours, in the Oval Office.
I could not help recalling my first visits to the US towards the end of apartheid. Vast numbers, especially of people of colour and young people, were on the streets in support of our life and death struggle for freedom. The US administration was brought to the party kicking and screaming, not for the first or last time in your history.
Some have argued that the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu did more than most to mobilise middle America to oppose Apartheid on the grounds that all God's children are of equal value.
As in South Africa, in the US, (like many other countries), students and young people have played a key role as the conscience and moral compass of the nation.
It was true during the civil rights movement, it was true during the Vietnam War, it was true during Black Lives Matter and Me Too ... and ... and now in the call for a Free Palestine and the stopping of the genocide in Gaza.
If black South Africans had wanted to commit genocide against the white population, they had the numbers. The real miracle is that the majority voted for a party that said, South Africa belongs to all who live in it and still say so today
It was Nelson Mandela who taught us that we would not be truly free until Palestine is free. Giving a lie to the charge of anti-Semitism, a disproportionate minority of South African freedom fighters were Jewish.
It has been heartening to witness the number of young Jewish Americans in the forefront of acts of solidarity with the Palestinians.
Even in the darkest days of apartheid, hospitals, universities and communities were not bombed, (incidentally paid for by the US taxpayer) which Israel continues to do in Gaza.
The tragedy of Israel is that a people who had survived the holocaust and a long history of anti-Semitism elect a government that pursues genocide and ethnic cleansing facilitated by weapons provided by the US.
It has been noteworthy that none of the mainstream media in South Africa or the US accept the white genocide narrative.
Most South Africans believe the “sin” we committed in the eyes of the US administration was to take Israel to the International Court of Justice at The Hague.
The greatest irony is that white South Africans who make up nearly 8% of the population own about 73% of the land. That is the greatest indictment of 30 years of democracy in South Africa.
My own church, the Anglican Church of South Africa, has thanked the Episcopal Church of the US for refusing to be party to the outrage of the resettlement of a group of committed racists.
If black South Africans had wanted to commit genocide against the white population, they had the numbers. The real miracle is that the majority voted for a party that said, South Africa belongs to all who live in it and still say so today.
Today our dreams have gone sour because of the all-pervasive greed and corruption that is destroying our society
The US of today has become a cautionary tale for us, showing us the danger of electing populist leaders especially those devoid of empathy.
Across Africa millions will die from HIV and Aids because of the arbitrary end of USAID and Pepfar funding. The soft power of the US has evaporated.
Nevertheless today in South Africa there is a rising generation with their own hopes and dreams and a belief that a new world is possible.
On a daily basis, the US and Apartheid Israel are becoming increasingly pariah states just as Apartheid South Africa was.
But this too shall pass.
For the people of South Africa our friendship and solidarity with countless people in the US is unbreakable even in these dark times as you confront evil while acting with kindness and compassion on the road to a better world.
The election of the first US-born Pope provides the US and the world with an alternative role model.
• Father Michael Lapsley SSM lost both his hands in a letter bomb sent by the apartheid government in 1990. Today he is the president of the Healing of Memories Global Network. His memoir Redeeming the Past: My Journey from Freedom Fighter to Healer was published by Orbis
For opinion and analysis consideration, e-mail Opinions@timeslive.co.za
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