DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — Rabbi Boruch Shlomo Cunin entered City Hall Monday morning humming a tune, a quiet announcement that he had arrived. Cunin is head of Chahad of California, and he joined others from the Chabad yesterday for a civic Chanukah ceremony held in the third floor rotunda of City Hall.

Soon after Cunin arrived, Rabbi Moshe Greenwald, from the Chabad of the Historic Core, welcomed the crowd and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Council president Eric Garcetti, and Councilwomen Wendy Gruel and Jan Perry.

Rabbi Greenwald dedicated this season’s lighting of the Menorah to the victims of the Mumbai terrorist attacks in late November of this year.

And the illumination is about that: Lighting the darkness.

“It’s the season to tell the entire world that the forces of evil and darkness have no place in God’s beautiful garden,” said Rabbi Boruch Shlomo Cunin.

At the end of the illumination, the Rabbi pulled the Mayor and the Council president back on the small stage for a quick Hora (circle dance) on small stage next to the Menora.