The earliest inhabitants of Palestine
Humans have inhabited the land of Palestine since ancient times, dating back approximately a million years. The offspring of Palestine built the oldest city in the world - Jericho - around 10,000 years ago, approximately 8000 BCE.
The Canaanite Arabs are considered the earliest known inhabitants of Palestine, emerging around the third millennium BCE. They became urban dwellers, inhabiting cities and towns, including Jericho, establishing most of Palestine's cities and villages, numbering around two hundred cities and villages by the second millennium BCE. Among these were cities like Shechem (Nablus and Balata), Beisan, Ashkelon, Akka, Haifa, Jaffa, Hebron, Ashdod, Aqr, Beersheba, Bethlehem, and others. They developed an alphabet that influenced other writing systems.
Due to Palestine's central location connecting three continents, it became a hub for religious gatherings and cultural influence on Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, and witnessed conflicts between major powers in the region, falling under the dominance of neighboring empires.
Egyptian dominance in Egypt and the Canaanites in Palestine faced constant confrontations by the second millennium BCE against racially diverse invaders like the Amorites. However, the Canaanites and Egyptians consistently managed to defeat the invaders. Nevertheless, by the 14th century BCE, Egyptian authority began to weaken, succumbing to new occupiers - the Hebrews, a group of Semitic tribes from Mesopotamia, and the Philistines, who later lent their name to the land. The Philistines were a people of Indo-European descent.