Prayers at the Western Wall: where do those slips of paper go?

The many written prayers and wishes crammed into the crevices of the Western Wall are being cleared out by workers using long wooden sticks.

It is part of a twice-yearly operation that takes place ahead of major Jewish festivals in in Jerusalem’s Old City.

Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, begins this Sunday night.

Tens of thousands of notes are left at the site and this week’s cleaning operation makes room for fresh prayers to be placed during the High Holy Days.

Shmuel Rabinowitz, the Western Wall’s rabbi, said: “We are now taking these notes out for safekeeping in the coming hours at Mount of Olives and hope that the prayers and requests of everybody will be fulfilled, and that it will be a good year for the entire year and to the house of Israel.

“A year of peace, a year in which there will be an end to bloodshed here and abroad.”

This time, the rite was held with precautions against coronavirus infection in place, after a relapse in Israel’s infection rate.

Workers in protective masks held onto their sticks with gloves as they extracted the paper notes left in ‘God’s mailbox’.

Religious authorities also operate a service in which people can email their prayers for placement between the stones.

The Western Wall is a remnant of the compound of the Second Temple that was destroyed in 70 AD.

It stands today beneath a religious plaza revered by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and by Jews as the Temple Mount.