The “City of Palms” spreads out on the west side of the Jordan River at 252 meters below sea level. Jericho is believed to be the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world! Archaeologists have unearthed the remains of more than 20 successive settlements in Jericho, the first of which dates back 11,000 years (9000 BCE), almost to the very beginning of the Holocene epoch of the Earth’s history.

For Christians, Jericho took on importance because of its association with John the Baptist, who has been baptised by the banks of the Jordan on the eastern boundary of the city (Matthew 3:13-15), and the story of the temptation of Christ (Matthew 4:1-4).