Charleston Shooter Manifesto Calls To ‘Destroy Jewish Identity’
Image by Handout/Getty Images
The South Carolina church shooter said in a racial manifesto that the Jewish “problem” would be solved “if we could somehow destroy the Jewish identity.”
Dylann Roof, who entered a Charleston, South Carolina church and killed nine black worshippers last week, published what is believed to be his racial manifesto on a website that is registered in his name. The website and the manifesto came to public attention on Saturday, by Sunday the website was blocked.
The 2,500-word document is rife with spelling errors and racial hatred. The website also shows photos of Roof burning a U.S. flag and aiming firearms.
Roof asserts in the manifesto that he was “not raised in a racist home or environment. Living in the South, almost every White person has a small amount of racial awareness, simply because of the numbers of negroes in this part of the country. But it is a superficial awareness.” He said the event that “truly awakened” him was the Trayvon Martin case in Florida, in which neighborhood watch coordinator George Zimmerman fatally shot the unarmed black teen.
Roof devotes most of the manifesto to a discussion of Blacks, who he calls “the biggest problem for Americans,” and who he says are “stupid and violent.” He discusses segregation, which he said “was not a bad thing. It was a defensive measure”; as well as slavery, the flight to the suburbs and racial mixing.
Roof calls Jews “enigma,” adding “I don’t pretend to understand why jews do what they do.” He said he believes that “the majority of American and European jews are White.”
“In my opinion the issues with jews is not their blood, but their identity. I think that if we could somehow destroy the jewish identity, then they wouldnt cause much of a problem. The problem is that Jews look White, and in many cases are White, yet they see themselves as minorities. Just like niggers, most jews are always thinking about the fact that they are jewish,” Roof wrote.
He added: “The other issue is that they network. If we could somehow turn every jew blue for 24 hours, I think there would be a mass awakening, because people would be able to see plainly what is going on.”
Roof gives what he calls “an explanation” for the attack he is about to pull off at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston: “I have no choice. I am not in the position to, alone, go into the ghetto and fight. I chose Charleston because it is most historic city in my state, and at one time had the highest ratio of blacks to Whites in the country. We have no skinheads, no real KKK, no one doing anything but talking on the internet. Well someone has to have the bravery to take it to the real world, and I guess that has to be me.”
Roof was arrested North Carolina on Thursday, the day after the shooting. He is being held on $1 million bond.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
