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Sadiq Khan was mobbed by members of the Jewish community when he arrived at the Yom HaShoah Holocaust memorial event in Barnet this afternoon.

In his first public engagement, he was greeted at the Bartnet Copthall stadium in north London by the chief rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, Holocaust survivors and leading figures in the UK Jewish community.

London’s newly elected mayor Sadiq Khan (R) speaks with Britain’s Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis Photograph: Peter Nicholls/Reuters

He is watching the two hour ceremony on the front row with Mirvis, the Israel ambassador to the UK, Mark Regev, the former Labour fundraiser Lord Levy and Eric Pickles, the government’s ambassador on post-Holocaust issues.

Khan said he was “honoured that my first public engagement will be such a poignant one, where I will meet and hear from Jewish survivors and refugees who wen through unimaginable horrors in the Holocaust”.

The selection of the event signalled a clear attempt to distance himself from the Labour leadership’s handling of recent anti-semitism controversies.

Henry Grunwald QC, former chair of the Jewish Leadership Council, told Khan from the stage: “You have promised to be a mayor for all Londoners. By your attendance here today we hope that you are beginning to fulfil that pledge.”

London’s newly elected mayor Sadiq Khan stands with holocaust survivor Ben Helfgott (2nd R), Britain’s Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis (R), and Israel’s ambassador to Britain Mark Regev (2nd L) Photograph: Peter Nicholls/Reuters