Amos Schonfield
Refugee and migrant rights advocate // Founder & CEO @oursecondhome.org.uk // AWFC masochist // Unsubtly bearded // Unfathomably Jewish // he/him
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldOne of the best things I’ve read in a while:
- If politicians really cared about about Jewish life, this project would've been a nonstarter. London has no Jewish Museum, probably the largest Jewish diaspora community not to have one. Jews deserve to remembered for more than their darkest moments. Build a befitting museum, then we can talk.
- This headline makes a mockery of both British Jews and for concept of asylum and safety. We are a community of refugees and those who welcomed them. We should all refuse to be a part of these games.
- This, not the other thing, is "Trump Derangement Syndrome"
- Please can someone in No. 10 actually tap in this open goal
- Reposted by Amos Schonfield“This isn’t the first time the synagogue has burned. On September 18, 1967, Beth Israel’s temple was bombed by local Ku Klux Klan members, in part because of the congregation’s work in the civil rights movement, according to the synagogue’s website.” www.cnn.com/2026/01/11/u...
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldI BEG every smug commentator who praised Mahmood for doing the “tough but necessary thing” to read this. All the disadvantages of plummeting immigration for the economy & public services, for NO POLITICAL GAIN. Labour in DESPERATE need of a 180 change of course on immigration
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldA reminder that Kemi Badenoch wants to create a UK “Removals Force” explicitly modelled on ICE
- Either human rights and international law exist for everyone, or they exist for no one. I won't mourn the Maduro regime, but we are less safe than we were yesterday – Venezuelan citizens least of all.
- "Arsenal in the Community doesn’t exist for headlines or highlights. It exists for Tuesdays at 2.30 pm, for small interventions, familiar faces, and work that rarely stops. And after seeing it up close, it’s hard to imagine this club without it."
- Reposted by Amos Schonfield79-year-old Paul Bojerski was born to Polish parents in a WWII German refugee camp. His family legally emigrated to the U.S. when he was 5. He’s been taken by ICE in Florida. www.orlandosentinel.com/2025/11/16/s...
- The fleeting promise of votes isn't worth the lasting, generational damage it'll cause.
- Locally, only 26% of people said immigration and asylum was in their top 3 issues. Nationally, it is double that. This Best of Britain polling shows how bought in everyone is to a moral panic. It is a vibes-based 'crisis' whose root cause cannot be addressed by cracking down on migrants yet again.
- Terrible news for someone really looking to push on and develop. Hopefully her work up to this point will put her in good stead for next season.
- Every few weeks there's a new govt announcement to raise the barriers against immigrants. It's as if, having ransacked public services, we've reduced British patriotism to spitting on our welcoming nature.
- A day of relief. A day of pictures of happy tears. It didn't always feel like this, but this day was always going to come. Agreements and negotiations work. May it be the latest healing day of many. May Palestinian families know the same relief felt today soon. 🎗
- This is a fantastic statement from the BoD, and it has rightfully received praise from a wide spectrum of people for this. The real test is one of consistency. Douglas Murray is just Robinson with a posh accent, and yet he is welcomed into our synagogues gladly.
- Amichai Chikli may be a small-minded fascist, but he is also monumentally bad at his job. Legacy diaspora institutions are desperate to support Israel, and he can't help but alienate them. That Netanyahu has let him fester in this job for 3 years is proof of how little the diaspora matters.
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- 10 years ago, @keithkahnharris.bsky.social wrote this prescient article. It is a useful guide for now. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldI never post on Yom Kippur but: When British Jews tell you antisemitism is getting worse BELIEVE US. It shouldn’t take us getting stabbed by terrorists on the holiest day in our calendar for you to believe us.
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldYou don’t actually have to both sides this. The Jewish community in the UK is not the Israeli government. You can just condemn the murder of two British Jews killed in their place of worship and you don’t have to say a single other thing.
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldAs long as the far right shapes public opinion, and mainstream parties follow public opinion, the far right dominates politics, whether in government or not.
- This is daft and I didn't imagine it needed to be said. Saying "I personally don't identify as English" is not the same as "migrants and their descendants can't identify as English". One is about personal feelings, and one is about excluding people based on immutable traits.
- In 35mins, this @99pi.org episode shows the challenge of our immigration debates. Our lives depend on thousands of people willing to take on jobs others won't for the sake of their safety and the safety their families. Communities understand this, and govts refuse to. pca.st/episode/cdef...
- Why are we treating migration - a necessity for the lives we lead - like DofE?
- Labour looking at Reform's racist policies and saying "we"ll have some of that". These aren't just discriminatory, by making migrants meet higher standards than the average person, they automatically treat migrants as if they are criminals on community service. #r4today www.bbc.com/news/article...
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldDetained people without lawyers are only given a few days' notice of the intention to send them to France. In this time they need to find a lawyer, who will then need to gather evidence and consider whether there is a claim. Of course court applications are being made only shortly before removal.
- Went into a bit of a rabbit hole listening to this and found out that (1) London doesn't have a municipal flag and (2) designer Juan Castro Varón has made one! flag.london
- Happy 15th Anniversary to us and to you! Without your ears and your curiosity for design, we wouldn't be where we are today. 🎂🥳 Join the party: 99percentinvisible.org/episode/641-...
- The summer transfer window has closed, with hundreds of millions changing hands once again. But alongside the billions spent on players, there’s another story worth telling: football giving. 🧵/5
- Having looked back at the 2023-2024 accounts of the charitable foundations of clubs in The Premier League, we can see that it was a record year for their charitable work. It's the first time collective giving has broken the £70m mark, and overall spending has risen by 28% over the past 5 years.
- Club foundations all spend their money differently, but the top 3 biggest Premier League givers are Chelsea, Newcastle & Liverpool. Three clubs have more-than-doubled their giving over the past 5 years: Newcastle, Liverpool & Wolves.
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View full threadThe question is: if clubs can spend billions on transfers, what does it say about the untapped potential for community investment? 5/5
- I’ve been thinking a lot about flags, obviously. "Why is it only in England that you can't raise a flag without being called racist?", is a common question from people not really getting the point. In England, unlike many countries, raising one is an everyday civic act. 🧵/6
- At @oursecondhome.org.uk, young people often paint the flags of the countries they fled. Sometimes those flags were worn by the very people who forced them out. But for them, a flag is still a memory of what home could be — and a rallying cry that we are still here.
- The 🏴 in “Operation Raise The Colours” carries a different weight. It is a symbol of power used to mark territory, often outside the so-called hotels housing people seeking sanctuary. They are deliberately trying to exclude those who have nothing from even the smallest slice of "home" - their bed.
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View full threadA flag can be many things: a memory, a hope, a rallying point. Right now, it is also a test. Will we act to make this country feel welcoming for all — or will we let those who seek to exclude decide what England’s flag stands for? 6/6
- Very few people navigate being in the public eye better than Lotte Wubben-Moy observer.co.uk/news/sport/a...
- The need for a clear alternative asylum policy has never been more apparent. British people understand rights, fairness, our historic role, and the economic benefits. Stop playing footsie with the radical right, and make the case. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldIn response to Arab parties uniting ahead of the elections, Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, a full-on Kahanist whose career is built on incitement, said: “Prosecute them, revoke their citizenship, encourage them to leave. Not voluntarily.” (1/7)
- I'm proud that @oursecondhome.org.uk was among the signatories #TogetherWithRefugees
- We’re joining 200+ orgs to say enough. These racist actions do not have broad public support. Yet the government and the media are fuelling them with hateful and divisive rhetoric. It's time to take responsibility and change the tune. #TogetherWithRefugees www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...
- Real-life panaceas are hard to come by, but proper, on the ground, youth work really does change futures for the better. Austerity meant cuts to youth work and youth clubs, and today's young people pay the price. This is just one step in the right direction. www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
- I am left angry and heartbroken by Awdah's murder
- Our colleague and longtime +972 Magazine contributor Awdah Hathaleen was shot dead in a settler attack on his village, Umm al-Khair, in Masafer Yatta. Read Awdah's contributions to +972 Magazine through the link: www.972mag.com/writer/awdah...
- And there's just 41 days until Dame Leah Williamson kicks off the season with the Arsenal 🤩
- Gaza needs 1,300 tons of food each day. This is 500-600 trucks a day. Any less induces hunger. When that builds up, famine is inevitable - developed as policy, enabled by global silence. The IDF said that an average of 71 trucks entered Gaza daily over the past month.
- A coverup that spiralled and spiralled, risking 100,000 lives (of whom some were killed by the Taliban), all to save the government the blushes of an uncomfortable truth – in 2025, you need a functioning, compassionate asylum system to cope with the global crises we face.
- More Lauren James please
- World class podcasting here. Criss-crossing the world to tell a big story in clear, simple ways.
- Reposted by Amos Schonfield🧵/1 #MediaLiteracy tip: Zohran Mamdani doesn't "make Jews feel unsafe" or "alarm Jewish voters," as social media posts and news headlines claimed. SOME Jewish folks feel that way. Not all. We are not a monolith. Universalizing about all Jews is dangerous. It fuels antisemitic conspiracy theories...
- An amazing victory underpinned by a generational communicator. Someone with the discipline and empathy to ward off serious attempts to derail his candidacy with attacks and to turn them into a way to reassure voters.
- This is very moving from Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
- This #WorldRefugeeDay we are further away than ever from the promise of the Refugee Convention, a global agreement that has saved and remade millions of lives worldwide. Each of us can commit to turning this authoritarian drift around.
- What's worse: that this is the dross the Tories are sharing on Facebook these days? Or that the exact people they're whipping up into a frenzy will likely eat this up?
- Annabel Rook is a remarkable person, and it is horrible that she has been taken from us so soon and like this. We never met, but she was a leader in the refugee sector with a lifelong commitment to make a difference and lived a stone's throw away. A true sadness.
- You can nominate @oursecondhome.org.uk - the UK's refugee youth movement - for support from Movement For Good! youth.movementforgood.com#nominateACha...
- Reposted by Amos SchonfieldRefugee Week is a time to celebrate those who seek refuge here and the contributions they make to our shared home. This year's theme is "Community Is A Superpower", and we, the UK's refugee youth movement, know this well – we are over 550 people from nearly 50 countries, but one OSH community.
- Rarely so neat an encapsulation of who will pay the price of Netanyahu's behaviour vs who is salivating over it
- This is an important step, if also too late this many months into the devastation of Gaza. While they're the most heinous leaders, let's not kid ourselves that these figureheads are the be all and end all...
- I think people have forgotten the difference between 'symbolic' & 'performative'. It is symbolic to sail a ship with a small amount of aid to draw attention to a famine-inducing blockade. It is performative to talk about the hostages in Gaza while opposing the very ceasefire that would release them.
