Parades Head Out in South Florida Every Night of Chanukah

South Florida just gained an extra light of Chanukah with a yearly tradition for Beis Moshiach to bring Chanukah light and joy to surrounding communities that goes well into the “ninth day of Chanukah.”

Beis Moshiach in Lauderhill, FL organizes parades for every day of Chanukah with two mitzvah tanks visiting communities all over South Florida and doing mivtzoyim. Around 15 to 20 cars accompany the tanks from the Inverrary, Lauderhill community for the nightly parades and mivtzoyim. The cities they visit include Plantation, Boca Raton, Hollywood, Parkland, Cooper City, South Beach, Sunny Isles and Key West.

This year Beis Moshiach has a large new tank that was dedicated in honor of Rabbi Motty Anati, who started Beis Moshiach and this Chanukah tradition over 28 years ago by hand crafting the floats (such as a 770 float and dreidel float) and hand carved menorahs attached to cars for the parade.

Both the old tank and new one too will hit the streets this Chanukah with music and mivtzoyim. They schedule to meet new people and old friends along the route and have a seudah at various houses. They leave every morning with the tanks to businesses for mivtzoyim and then in the evenings go to restaurants and houses for private menorah lightings.

The first night’s parade on Sunday night returns to the Beis Moshiach shul for a grand Chanukah party open to the whole community for a seudah, music and dancing. On Motzei Shabbos, the seventh night, they expect close to 100 cars to join the parade all the way to South Beach, where they will bring dancing and music to people on the streets and light a large 16 foot menorah and display fireworks.

Every night features the lighting of the large and festively-lit traveling menorah with music and lights bringing joy to different stops and crowds. On Monday night, the second candle, the parade will be going to City Hall to light it with the mayor of Lauderhill. Other nights they will stop at restaurants such as Mozart café in Sunny Isles and invite Jewish people from the street to light the menorah. They also go to private houses to light it, making 10 to 15 stops every day with the parade in each area. Chanukah treats distributed there include sufganayit and latkes.

The last night of Chanukah, on Sunday Dec. 5th, after lighting the 8th candle, the parade leaves at midnight to Key West, arriving there around 4 or 5 am. Some families from the Lauderhill community join with their children in their car menorahs.

“Everyone sleeps in their cars for a few hours and then at 8 am we go to the Chabad House there for breakfast, shachris and mitvoyim, where we put tefillin on people in the area,” said Shlomi Ben-Shimon, who’s been organizing the Chanukah week’s parades for the past 11 years. “Then we go to the streets in Key West and light a 9th candle there in the evening just for persumi nisah.”

People can join wherever and whenever they want through a whatsapp group that posts updates. Contact Shlomy Ben-Shimon for more information at (954) 648-4473.