Yom HaShoah: 5,000 expected at community’s largest Holocaust commemoration

Up to 5,000 people are expected to attend the community’s largest ever Holocaust remembrance event on Sunday to mark Yom HaShoah.

To recognise the poignant 70th anniversary of the Holocaust, a special large scale National UK Yom HaShoah Commemoration is being held at Barnet Copthall Stadium from 2pm, a venue with the capacity to seat 5,000 people.

More than 3,000 seats have already been reserved.

Some 120 communal organisations have teamed up to commemorate this landmark event through the ‘Remember Together We Are One’ campaign, launched this week by Yom HaShoah UK.

Chairman Neil Martin said: “In what many are calling ‘the last of the big anniversaries’, we,re bringing together the largest gathering of the Jewish community ever to remember together the loss of six million and to pay tribute and say thank you to the survivors and refugees for the remarkable contributions they have made to the Jewish community and wider UK society.”

Mick Davis, chairman of the Jewish Leadership Council said: “In this significant year of anniversary, I urge everybody who is able to come to the commemoration and help to ensure the message is ‘Never Again’.

“The Yom Hashoah commemoration is an important opportunity for the community to come together in solemn memory.”

Vivan Wineman, president of the Board of Deputies, said: “This year the significance of the day is greatly increased. this may be our last chance to commemorate the tragedy in the presence of the only people who can be living witnesses to it. I hope, therefore, that as many members of our community attend.”