South African refugee Charl Kleinhaus, right, arrives at Dulles International Airport in Virginia on Monday. (Craig Hudson/For The Washington Post)
Just two days after
arriving in the United States as a refugee from South Africa, Charl Kleinhaus found himself at the center of a very American media firestorm.
Kleinhaus, 46,
drew widespread criticism this week over his social media posts over the past two years about Jewish people and Israel — criticism that came while he and his family are being aided by a Jewish-affiliated resettlement group in Buffalo.
In one post, he responded to video of a scuffle between Israeli police and Christians by writing that “Jews are untrustworthy and a dangerous group.”
But Kleinhaus, one of the 59
Afrikaners who was welcomed under an executive order by President Donald Trump, says his posts on X were taken out of context. In an interview Thursday, he denied the allegations spreading across the internet that he is antisemitic.
“You get angry. You get irrational. You say stupid things,” Kleinhaus told The Washington Post. “It was completely misinterpreted. It’s not against everybody. I was speaking about the people there.”
“I was very, very angry with the video, and I will protect my Christian heritage and my Christian faith all the way,” he continued. “I probably should have worded it better.”
The controversy over his posts has emerged as the identities and backgrounds of the Afrikaners granted refugee status comes into clearer focus. All are members of a White minority that Trump has said faces “genocide” in South Africa stemming from a land redistribution law signed earlier this year that is meant to correct disparities caused during more than four decades of apartheid rule.
It also comes amid a broader effort by federal officials to screen immigrants for allegedly antisemitic statements, including several prominent cases of university students or researchers who were detained and had their visas revoked over their involvement in protesting the war in Gaza.
The Department of Homeland Security said last month that it would consider “antisemitic activity on social media” as grounds to deny visas and citizenship applications.
On Thursday, a DHS spokesperson said in a statement that the department “vets all refugee applicants. Any claims of misconduct are thoroughly investigated, and appropriate action will be taken as necessary.”
Kleinhaus and the others who traveled on a State Department-chartered plane Monday are the first refugees to arrive after the White House
suspended admissions for all others who have been granted that humanitarian status.
Refugees are a distinct class of people who are fleeing war or political persecution in their home countries and who are allowed to enter the U.S. after a government screening process that usually takes several years. They are placed upon their arrival in the U.S. with one of about 10
resettlement agencies, most of which are religiously affiliated and work with the federal government to help refugees to find housing and jobs.
Kleinhaus confirmed that he was being resettled by a local affiliate of HIAS, the only Jewish-affiliated group. HIAS’s national office and its Buffalo affiliate, Jewish Family Services of Western New York, did not respond to multiple calls and messages seeking comment.
Other
national resettlement agencies have said they will serve any refugees assigned to them but have also expressed concern that the Afrikaners — who were screened in about three months and bypassed some normal steps in the vetting process — are being prioritized over thousands of others from countries such as Afghanistan, Ukraine and Myanmar who have been waiting far longer.
One resettlement group run by the Episcopal Church
said this week it would no longer resettle any refugees because of the Trump administration’s directive to resettle Afrikaners.
Kleinhaus acknowledged writing some other posts on X that have garnered criticism, which were first reported Wednesday by the
Bulwark news outlet. Some of the posts have since been deleted.
In one, Kleinhaus said a person who was accused of beating up the driver of a Tesla “needs a beating.” He also reshared a video of Orthodox Jewish Israelis spitting on Christians.
But, he said, he has been bombarded online with accusations online of antisemitism that he claims are unfair and untrue, adding that he supports Israel in its war in Gaza. “They don’t know who they’re talking about,” he said. “I didn’t call for any harm on any Jewish person. I will never do that.”
Kleinhaus, an evangelical Protestant, said he has some Jewish ancestry. A great-great-great-grandmother on his paternal side was a German Jew, he said, and his mother’s father fought in World War II alongside the British Army and against the Nazis.
Kleinhaus said one of the comments he made was copied and pasted from a different X account while he was recovering from a surgical procedure to have kidney stones removed. He said he was angry to
see footage of Orthodox Israelis spitting on Christians on the same day Hamas attacked Israel, Oct. 7, 2023.
“You must also respect my religion, and it wasn’t right,” he said. “It was a thing out of anger that I did, and I forgot about it.”
President Donald Trump issued an executive order in February to welcome the Afrikaners, a minority group descended from Dutch settlers in South Africa, in response to a newly signed land redistribution law in South Africa as well as the country’s foreign policy stance toward Israel.
South Africa, a longtime U.S. ally that is deepening its ties with Iran, last year
accused Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza at the International Court of Justice. The White House has
since ordered federal agencies to suspend work with the Group of 20 conference set to be hosted by South Africa this year, though Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa are set to meet next week to “reset the strategic relationship between the two countries,” Ramaphosa’s office said in
a statement.
The land redistribution law, known as the Expropriation Act, seeks to correct what South African officials have labeled an imbalance in property ownership following decades of apartheid rule. No land seizures have been carried out under that law so far, and South African officials have denied Trump’s claims that a genocide is taking place in South Africa.
But Kleinhaus, who said his family had sold the vast majority of their farm in Limpopo province decades ago, pointed to what he said had been a disturbing pattern of crime on his property and violence committed against his neighbors.
Those neighbors have been beaten to death, shot or killed, he said, including one
elderly farmer in his town just weeks ago. The machinery on his granite and ore mine — which he started operating on the land his family still owns — was destroyed, and one of his workers died suspiciously two years ago in a case that he claimed police linked to medical issues.
A State Department memo obtained by The Washington Post said that most of the arriving Afrikaners “have witnessed or experienced extreme violence with a racial nexus,” including murders and carjackings, and do not trust the South African police to investigate those cases.
Kleinhaus, who arrived in Buffalo with his two adult children and grandson, is currently living in a short-term-stay apartment in Buffalo while they search for jobs and more permanent housing. He said he is relieved to be able to walk around at night now without worrying about violence.
“To start over is scary, but it’s safe here,” he said. “I don’t want my children to be killed just because they’re on a farm and not to be told they stole land.”
Kleinhaus was hoping to be resettled in Arizona to find work in that field, he said. But given the local industries more common in Buffalo, he said he hopes to find a job operating similar kinds of heavy machinery or as a truck driver.
He has not received any direct cellphone numbers for federal officials, as they promised him at a news conference at Dulles International Airport on Monday. But there was no need: The family’s case workers at Jewish Family Services of Western New York had been more than helpful as they showed him how to fill out paperwork to receive work authorization and other basic necessities.
“They’re really good to me. I can’t complain about anything,” he said. “They ask if you’re okay. They ask what you need. … God bless them.”
