History (Source: Wikipedia)


Ancient times

Jericho is believed to be one of the oldest continuously-inhabited cities in the world, with evidence of settlement dating back to 9000 BC, providing important information about early human habitation in the Near East. The first permanent settlement was built near the Ein as-Sultan spring between 8000 and 7000 BC by an unknown people, and consisted of a number of walls, a religious shrine, and a 23-foot (7.0 m) tower with an internal staircase. After a few centuries, it was abandoned for a second settlement, established in 6800 BC, perhaps by an invading people who absorbed the original inhabitants into their dominant culture. Artifacts dating from this period include ten skulls, plastered and painted so as to reconstitute the individuals' features. These represent the first example of portraiture in art history, and it is thought that these were kept in people's homes while the bodies were buried. This was followed by a succession of settlements from 4500 BC onward, the largest of these being constructed in 2600 BC.

Archaeological evidence indicates that in the latter half of the Middle Bronze Age (circa 1700 BC), the city enjoyed some prosperity, its walls having been strengthened and expanded. The Canaanite city (Jericho City IV) was destroyed c.1550 BC, and the site remained uninhabited until the city was refounded in the 9th century BC.

In the 8th century BC, the Assyrians invaded from the north, followed by the Babylonians, and Jericho was depopulated between 586 and 538 BC, the period of the Jewish exile to Babylon. Cyrus the Great, the Persian king, refounded the city one mile southeast of its historic site at the mound of Tell es-Sultan, and returned the Jewish exiles after conquering Babylon in 539 BC.

Classical antiquity

Jericho went from being an administrative center under Persian rule, to serving as the private estate of Alexander the Great between 336 and 323 BC after his conquest of the region. In the middle of the 2nd century BC, Jericho was under Hellenistic rule, and the Syrian General Bacchides built a number of forts to strengthen the defenses of the area around Jericho against invasion by the Macabees (1 Macc 9:50). One of these forts, built at the entrance to Wadi Qelt, was later refortified by Herod the Great, who named it Kypros after his mother.

Herod initially leased Jericho from Cleopatra after Mark Antony gave it to her as a gift. After their joint suicide in 30 BC, Octavian assumed control of the Roman empire and granted Herod free rein over Jericho. Herod’s rule oversaw the construction of a hippodrome-theater (Tel es-Samrat) to entertain his guests and new aqueducts to irrigate the area below the cliffs and reach his winter palace built at the site of Tulul al-Alaiq.

The dramatic murder of Aristobulus III in a swimming pool at Jericho, as told by the Roman Jewish historian Josephus, took place during a banquet organized by Herod's Hasmonean mother-in-law. The city, since the construction of its palaces, functioned not only as an agricultural center and as a crossroad, but as a winter resort for Jerusalem's aristocracy.


Herod was succeeded by his son, Archelus, who built an adjacent village in his name, Archelais, to house workers for his date plantation (Khirbet al-Beiyudat). First century Jericho is described in Strabo's Geography as follows:

"Jericho is a plain surrounded by a kind of mountainous country, which in a way, slopes toward it like a theatre. Here is the Phoenicon, which is mixed also with all kinds of cultivated and fruitful trees, though it consists mostly of palm trees. It is 100 stadia in length and is everywhere watered with streams. Here also are the Palace and the Balsam Park."

The rock cut tombs of a Herodian and Hasmonean era cemetery lie in the lowest part of the cliffs between Nuseib al-Aweishireh and Jebel Quruntul in Jericho and were used between 100 BC and 68 AD.

The Christian Bible states that Jesus passed through Jericho where he healed two blind men and converted a local tax collector named Zacharias. After the fall of Jerusalem to Vespasian armies in 70 AD, Jericho declined rapidly, and by 100 AD it was but a small Roman garrison town. A fort was built there in 130 that played a role in putting down the Bar Kochba revolt in 133. Accounts of Jericho by a Christian pilgrim are given in 333. Shortly thereafter, the built-up area of the town was abandoned, and a Byzantine Jericho, Ericha was built a mile to the east, around which the modern town is centered.Christianity took hold in the city during the Byzantine era and the area was heavily populated. A number of monasteries and churches were built, including St. George of Koziba in 340 AD and a domed church dedicated to Saint Eliseus. At least two synagogues were also built in the 6th century CE. The monasteries were abandoned after the Persian invasion of 614.

Arab caliphate period

By 661, Jericho was under the rule of the Umayyad dynasty. The tenth caliph of that dynasty, Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik, built a palatial complex known as Khirbet al-Mafjar about one mile north of Tell as-Sultan in 743, and two mosques, a courtyard, mosaics, and other items from it can still be seen in situ today, despite its having been partially destroyed in an earthquake in 747.

Umayyad rule ended in 750 and was followed by the Arab caliphates of the Abbasid and Fatimid dynasties. Irrigated agriculture was developed under Islamic rule, reaffirming Jericho's reputation as a fertile "City of the Palms". Al-Maqdisi, the Arab geographer, wrote in 985 that, "the water of Jericho is held to be the highest and best in all Islam. Bananas are plentiful, also dates and flowers of fragrant odor." Jericho is also referred to by him as one of the principal cities of Jund Filastin.

The city flourished until 1071 and the invasion of the Seljuk Turks, followed by the upheavals of the Crusades. In 1179, the Crusaders rebuilt the Monastery of St. George of Koziba, at its original site six miles from the center of town. They also built another two churches and a monastery dedicated to John the Baptist, and are credited with introducing sugarcane production to the city. In 1187, the Crusaders were evicted by the Ayyubid forces of Saladin after their victory in the Battle of Hattin, and the town slowly went into decline.

In 1226, Arab geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi said of Jericho, "it has many palm trees, also sugarcane in quantities, and bananas. The best of all the sugar in the Ghaur land is made here." In the 14th century, Abu al-Fida writes there are sulfur mines in Jericho, "the only ones in Palestine."


Ottoman period (1517–1918)

In the early years of Ottoman rule, Jericho formed part of the waqf and imerat of Jerusalem. The villagers processed indigo as one source of revenue, using a cauldron specifically for this purpose that was loaned to them by the Ottoman authorities in Jerusalem. For most of the Ottoman period, Jericho was a small village of farmers susceptible to attacks by Bedouins. In the 19th century, European scholars, archaeologists and missionaries visited often. The first excavation at Tell as-Sultan was carried out in 1867, and the monasteries of St. George of Koziba and John the Baptist were refounded and completed in 1901 and 1904, respectively.

20th century

After the collapse of the Ottoman empire at the end of World War I, Jericho, like other places in Ottoman Palestine, fell under the rule of the British Mandate. The British built fortresses in Jericho during World War II with the help of the Jewish company Solel Boneh, and bridges were rigged with explosives in preparation for a possible invasion by German allied forces.

Jericho was captured by the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. The Jericho Conference, organized by King Abdullah and attended by over 2,000 Palestinian delegates in 1948 proclaimed "His Majesty Abdullah as King of all Palestine" and called for "the unification of Palestine and Transjordan as a step toward full Arab unity." In mid-1950, Jordan formally annexed the West Bank and Jericho residents, like other residents of West Bank localities became Jordanian citizens.

Jericho was captured from Jordan by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967 along with the rest of the West Bank. It was one of the first cities handed over to Palestinian Authority control in 1994, in accordance with the Oslo accords, which saw construction of the Oasis casino. The other city handed over to the Palestinians was Gaza.

21st century

On March 14, 2006, the Israel Defense Forces launched Operation Bringing Home the Goods, in which it took captive six inmates from a Jericho prison following a 10-hour siege. Israel's reason for the siege was to capture PFLP general secretary, Ahmad Sa'adat and five other inmates for the alleged assassination of Israeli tourist minister Rehavam Zeevi because of announcements of their upcoming release. Both sides of the siege were armed and at least two people were killed and 35 wounded in the incident. Before the siege British and American monitors were guarding the prison but withdrew, citing lax security arrangements. The siege caused an uproar amongst the PFLP members and supporters as well as other PLO factions, and as a result Palestinian militants raided and kidnapped British and European citizens in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The event is considered controversial and somewhat hampered Palestinian relations with the UK and US.

After Hamas assaulted a neighborhood in Gaza mostly populated by the Fatah-aligned Hilles clan in response to their attack on Hamas which killed six of its members, the Hilles clan was relocated to Jericho on 4 August 2008.