The Western Wall Plaza is a large public square situated adjacent to the Western Wall in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. It was formed in 1967 as a result of the razing of the Mughrabi Quarter neighborhood at the very end of the Six-Day War.

The Western Wall Plaza abuts the Western Wall, part of the ancient retaining wall erected by Herod the Great to surround and increase the surface area of the Temple Mount. Apart from the Western Wall to the east, the plaza is bordered on its north side by the two Western Wall Foundation facilities (the Chain of Generations Center and the entrance to the Western Wall Tunnels), Yeshivat Netiv Aryeh, and a passage to the Muslim Quarter to the Valley Street (HaGay or al-Wad) [de]; by Aish HaTorah, Porat Yosef Yeshiva and the Jewish Quarter via the Yehuda HaLevi Stairs on its west side; and by the Jerusalem Archaeological Park and the exits towards Dung Gate on its south.

The plaza measures 10,000 square meters and can accommodate up to 400,000 persons per day.^[1][2]

The plaza is divided by a low wall of Jerusalem stone into two sections. A smaller section immediately adjacent to the Western Wall, and further divided into two sections by a mechitza for opposite genders, serves as an open-air synagogue. It has since become a popular place to hold bar mitzva ceremonies.^[9]

The larger section immediately west and south of the smaller one acts as a crowd overflow area for the first, but by itself serving as the location for induction ceremonies of IDF soldiers.

While the plaza is open to all, the Ministry of Religious Services employs modesty guards to ensure visitors dress appropriately to the holiness of the site and as a courtesy to worshipers.^{[dubious – discuss][citation needed]}

In August 1967, the architect Yosef Shenberger was called upon to present a design for the plaza, but his idea quickly became the first of many to be torpedoed by planning boards.

In 1970, landscape architect Shlomo Aronson proposed digging the eastern plaza down to the street level of the Second Temple period.

In 1972, Moshe Safdie was hired to submit a proposal for the plaza. He followed Aronson's plan somewhat, with a series of terraced plazas descending to the Herodian era street level adjacent to the Western Wall, but his proposal was scrapped as well.^[10]

In 1976, Irwin Shimron headed the Shimron Committee, which was set up to explore all the options for the development of the plaza. The committee recommended implementing Safdie's proposal, with nothing coming of it to date.

• List of city squares by size