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Source: https://jcpa.org/article/the-western-wall-and-the-jews-more-than-a-thousand-years-of-prayer/
The Western Wall and the Jews: More than a Thousand Years of Prayer
(Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs) Nadav Shragai - The current place of worship at the Western Wall was established after an earthquake in 1546, which collapsed a row of buildings leaning against the Western Wall and cleared a short prayer alley for Jews, used with the approval of the Ottoman authorities. The central synagogue of the Jews in Jerusalem was located inside the Western Wall tunnels for many years, until the city fell to the Crusaders in 1099. The Jewish scholar Yitzhak Yehezkiel Yehuda collected dozens of testimonies of Jewish prayers throughout many points in time, beginning in 950 CE. They were submitted to the 1930 British Western Wall Commission, testifying to the Jewish connection to the place. The writer, a fellow of the Jerusalem Center, has documented Jerusalem for Ha'aretz and Israel Hayom for over 30 years.