Jewish boat vies for spot in Amsterdam gay parade

Boat part of a three-day event in August for gay Jews from all over the world

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Amsterdam’s annual gay boat parade may feature a Jewish float for the first time.

The Jewish boat for the Amsterdam Pride Canal Parade 2014 is a project launched by a group called Exodays, whose board is made up of several young Jewish activists.

“For a long time Amsterdam has been called the Gay Capital of the World. Jews have played leading roles in this process and marked its landscape,” the group’s website reads.

The 2014 event will be the 19th year straight that the parade — which organizers say is the world’s only regularly-held aquatic event of its kind — will take place.

The boat is one part of a three-day event for gay Jews from all over the world that Exodays is organizing in Amsterdam set for August 1st to 3rd.

To participate in the Amsterdam Pride Canal Parade 2014, the group that is organizing the Jewish boat needs to be selected in a lottery next week.

Every year, more than 100 boats compete for approximately 80 spots that are allowed to take part in the annual event.

In previous years, the event has drawn thousands of participants from dozens of countries and tens of thousands of spectators who huddle along Amsterdam’s Prinsengracht canal to watch the colorful, themed floats chart a west-to-east course of roughly two to four hours.