Jewish Gooners launched at Emirates Stadium
search

The latest Jewish News

Read this week’s digital edition

Click Here

Jewish Gooners launched at Emirates Stadium

Former Arsenal player Perry Groves and Lord Mann joined 70 members of football's newest community group celebrating their Jewish roots and love of the beautiful game

Jewish Gooners Pic: The Arsenal Football Club PLC
Jewish Gooners Pic: The Arsenal Football Club PLC

A group of Jewish Arsenal football supporters have set up a group to celebrate their identity as a community.

Ahead of Sunday’s match against Brighton & Hove Albion, the newly launched ‘Jewish Gooners’ celebrated with a party at Emirates Stadium in Holloway, north London.

Committee member Barry Frankfurt said: “A group of us have been going to games together for years. Arsenal has always been a community for us and we’ve always felt welcome here. We’ve met people from different backgrounds that we’d never meet otherwise in life thanks to going to Arsenal, home and away.

Jewish Gooners with Arsenal FC Chief Executive, Vinai Venkatesham,

“We decided it would be fantastic to merge some areas of our Jewish heritage and our love for the club and we’re excited to work together with Arsenal to celebrate our identity. It was brilliant to bring so many of us together to officially launch our group. It was a proud moment when we saw our banner inside the Emirates for the first time.”

Around 70 supporters attended the launch event, including club legend Perry Groves and Lord John Mann, the UK Government’s independent advisor on antisemitism.

Lord Mann, said: “It’s fantastic to see Arsenal and their community of Jewish supporters working together in this special way. Football has a unique power to unite communities and Arsenal and Jewish Gooners are setting the example for others to follow. I’m looking forward to seeing what they can achieve together, and I’m delighted to support them on their journey.”

Arsenal Football Clubu CEO, Vinai Venkatesham presented the group with a ‘Jewish Gooners 23’ shirt to mark the occasion, whilst executive vice chair, Tim Lewis welcomed the members pitchside ahead of kick-off.

Venkatesham said: “It’s great to see so many supporters coming out to celebrate today’s launch and having such a wonderful time together. We’re proud to have Jewish Gooners as part of our family.

“Our aim is to make everyone feel welcome at Arsenal and we’re looking forward to working together and supporting each other as we continue our work to celebrate and champion our diverse communities.”

Support your Jewish community. Support your Jewish News

Thank you for helping to make Jewish News the leading source of news and opinion for the UK Jewish community. Today we're asking for your invaluable help to continue putting our community first in everything we do.

For as little as £5 a month you can help sustain the vital work we do in celebrating and standing up for Jewish life in Britain.

Jewish News holds our community together and keeps us connected. Like a synagogue, it’s where people turn to feel part of something bigger. It also proudly shows the rest of Britain the vibrancy and rich culture of modern Jewish life.

You can make a quick and easy one-off or monthly contribution of £5, £10, £20 or any other sum you’re comfortable with.

100% of your donation will help us continue celebrating our community, in all its dynamic diversity...

Engaging

Being a community platform means so much more than producing a newspaper and website. One of our proudest roles is media partnering with our invaluable charities to amplify the outstanding work they do to help us all.

Celebrating

There’s no shortage of oys in the world but Jewish News takes every opportunity to celebrate the joys too, through projects like Night of Heroes, 40 Under 40 and other compelling countdowns that make the community kvell with pride.

Pioneering

In the first collaboration between media outlets from different faiths, Jewish News worked with British Muslim TV and Church Times to produce a list of young activists leading the way on interfaith understanding.

Campaigning

Royal Mail issued a stamp honouring Holocaust hero Sir Nicholas Winton after a Jewish News campaign attracted more than 100,000 backers. Jewish Newsalso produces special editions of the paper highlighting pressing issues including mental health and Holocaust remembrance.

Easy access

In an age when news is readily accessible, Jewish News provides high-quality content free online and offline, removing any financial barriers to connecting people.

Voice of our community to wider society

The Jewish News team regularly appears on TV, radio and on the pages of the national press to comment on stories about the Jewish community. Easy access to the paper on the streets of London also means Jewish News provides an invaluable window into the community for the country at large.

We hope you agree all this is worth preserving.

read more: