How many cities were in Canaan at the time of the Israelite invasion?

Answer 1

At the time attribute to the Israelite invasion, the Philistines occupied the rich coastal plains and foothills south of present-day Tel Aviv, while the Canaanites largely occupied the coastal plains and foothills to the north. The mountainous hinterland, that Israel and Judah actually occupied, was sparsely occupied, with a few small villages at most. The one significant town in that area was Jerusalem, which seems to have been unwalled. There was no need for defensive walls or other defence mechanisms because the occupying power, Egypt, assured the security of all towns in its colonial territory.

At previous times, the hinterland seems to have been occupied, perhaps when the coastal towns were under some form of threat, but significant occupation had never been permanent. The city of Jericho was last abandoned around 1800 BCE, centuries before the time of the supposed invasion, and was not rebuilt until later in the first millennium BCE. The city of Ai, supposedly the second city to be captured, similarly did not exist at the time.

Scholars say that there simply was no invasion. The Israelites arose out of the West Semitic, or Canaanite, milieu and for some reason began to peacefully occupy the hinterland, in small numbers at first. They built all the cities in the region, during the period of the divided monarchy. By the time that the scriptures were being written, the Hebrew people had built up legends of a glorious past. Behind these legends, there were not really any cities and they were not captured one by one.