Two supporters of the UK football club West Ham have been arrested and suspended by the club after being filmed harassing a Chasidic Jewish man with antisemitic slurs on a RyanAir flight to Belgium.
As passengers boarded the plane in London, a group of supporters of West Ham, who were traveling to Belgium for a Europa League game, began chanting an antisemitic song as they watched a Haredi man walking down the aisle to his seat.
The disgraceful song, which is commonly sung against the predominantly “Jewish Club” Tottenham Hotspur, mocks the Jewish religious practice of circumcision, ending with the taunt, “I’ve got a foreskin, haven’t you?”
Source: New York Folk
In reaction to the incident, West Ham said it was “appalled by the contents of the video circulating on social media and condemn the behavior of the individuals involved.”
The club’s manager, David Moyes, said, “I have to say first of all that I don’t see our football club being like that. We are a diverse football club. There’s no room for discrimination anywhere. We don’t want to be associated with supporters like this.”
Marie van der Zyl, President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, commented, “This is a particularly horrible example of a Jewish man being subjected to abuse and humiliation. Thankfully, the culprits have been captured on social media. West Ham has set exactly the right example – hate will only be tackled in our society when we all take responsibility, as West Ham has done in promising to impose lifetime bans.”
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