JERUSALEM — For centuries, people have stuffed prayers written on scraps of paper into the ancient cracks in the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem — and now they can tweet them, too.

The Western Wall now has its own address on the social networking service, Twitter, allowing believers around the globe to have their prayers placed between its 2,000 year-old- stones without leaving their armchairs.

The service’s founder, Alon Nil, says petitioners can tweet their prayers, and they will be printed out and taken to the wall, where they will join the thousands of handwritten notes placed by visitors who believe their requests will find a shortcut to God by being deposited there.

The 25-year-old economist started the Twitter page three weeks ago and has already received hundreds of prayers.

“It all started a while after the riots in Iran, and I realized the potential of Twitter,” Nil said. “There are an infinite number of uses for Twitter, and I thought, ‘What can I do that is new and creative and might benefit the people of Israel?’ ”

Nil monitors Twitter as a hobby, but he hopes his small operation can help bring people around the world together.

“You name the country, I’ve gotten prayers from them,” he said. “I hope in some way that by tweeting their prayers, these people are helping themselves somehow. Once you figure out what you want, in 140 characters or less, you can start to take action.”

No charge is made for placing a prayer at the wall. Visitors to Twitter’s companion Web site, Tweet Your Prayers, are invited to make donations by credit card.

Nil wasn’t prepared for the overwhelming interest in his venture. On Thursday night, he had more than 1,000 unread messages.

More information can be found at twitter.com/theKotel.