Shechem, occupied from about 2000, is traditionally associated with the site of Tell Balatah in Balata al-Balad in the West Bank, though it may have been located on nearby Mount Gerizim).

The Eblaite Tablets mention Shechem as a city of which Rasap (Resheph) is the patron deity.

A god of plague and war, Resheph is associated with lightning, and hence interpreted as a weather deity.

Mentioned also is the Canaanite city of Shechem, centered on a natural oasis that is watered by numerous springs.

First settled in about 6000 BCE, Shechem lies in an enclosed, fertile valley in central Palestine, athwart an east-west pass between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal, one of the few such routes in Palestine's hill country.

Shechem is a strong walled city, with a triple gate, a fortress-temple, and an acropolis during the rule of Egypt’s Hyksos kings.

The Hyksos may include elements of a grouping of people, largely Semitic, called the Habiru, or Hapiru.

The term, meaning outsiders, is applied to nomads, fugitives, bandits and workers of inferior status, and may be etymologically related to the word Hebrew.

The Habiru apparently establish a frontier military aristocracy in Palestine, bringing to the Canaanite towns new defenses and new prosperity, as well as many Egyptian cultural elements, without interrupting the basic character of the local culture.

The Egyptians destroy Shechem around 1550.

Thutmose’s successful campaign in Syria-Palestine establishes an Egyptian empire in southwestern Asia, secures the fealty of all the rebellious princes except its Mitanni leader, and spurs Assyria, Babylonia and the Hittites to pay tribute to Egypt.

Shechem is rebuilt and reoccupied around 1450 as a significant strategic point in Egypt’s Asiatic empire.

Shachmu (i.e., Shechem) is the center of a kingdom carved out by Labaya (or Labayu), a Canaanite warlord who recruits mercenaries from among the Habiru.

Labaya is the author of three Amarna letters from about 1350 BCE, and his name appears in eleven of the other three hundred and eighty-two letters, referred to twenty-eight times, with the basic topic of the letter, being Labaya himself, and his relationship with the rebelling, country-dwelling Habiru.

Labaya and his sons exert influence over a wide region in Samaria, and threaten many powerful Canaanite towns, including Jerusalem, Gezer, (called 'Gazru'), and Megiddo.

The Amarna letters give an incomplete look at Labaya's career.

In the first of Labaya's letters thus far discovered (EA 252), he defends himself to the Pharaoh against complaints of other city rulers about him (for example, the complaint that he has hired mercenaries from among the Habiru).

Labaya further admits to having invaded Gezer and insulting its king Milkilu.

He denies any knowledge of his son's alleged collaboration with the Habiru.

The Canaanites continue to prosper in their cities great and small but this is a time of much political unrest.

The Hittites are invading Syria; nomads from the desert support the invasion, and many of the local chiefs are ready to seize the opportunity to throw off the Egyptian yoke.

Shechem, a prosperous capital of the fertile and populous northern highlands In the hill country of central Palestine, becomes the site of the cult of the Canaanite god Ba'al-Berit, Lord of the Covenant.

The city of Shechem, including its Bronze Age temple, falls to the Hebrews and is again destroyed around 1100, according to archaeological excavations.

According to the Bible, after Gideon's death, Abimelech, his son by a Sichemite concubine, was made king (Judges 9:1-6).

Yotam, the youngest son of Gideon, made a famous speech on Mount Gerizim known as Yotam's allegory where he warned the people of Shechem about Abimelech's future tyranny (Judges 9:7-20).

Three years later, when the city had risen in rebellion, Abimelech took it, utterly destroyed it, and burnt the temple of Baal-berith where the people had fled for safety.

…Shechem, and on …

Jeroboam, according to 1 Kings 11:26-39, was born the son of Nebat an Ephrathite of Zereda whose mother's name was Zeruah (who later became a widow, and could have been leprous as her name translates).

While still young, he had been promoted by Solomon to be chief superintendent of the "burnden", i.e., the bands of forced laborers.

Influenced by the words of the prophet Ahijah, he began to form conspiracies with the view of becoming king of the ten tribes; but these having been discovered, he fled to Egypt (1 Kings 11:29-40), where he remained for a length of time under the protection of Shoshenq.

On the death of Solomon, the ten tribes, having revolted, send to invite him to become their king and he is accordingly proclaimed "king of Israel" (1 Kings 12:1-20).

He rebuilds and fortifies Shechem as the capital of his kingdom.

He at once adopts means to perpetuate the division thus made between the two parts of the kingdom, and ...

Shechem is probably the capital of Ephraim (1 Kings 4).

Rebuilt in the tenth century BCE, Shechem was the place appointed, after Solomon's death, for the meeting of the people of Israel and the investiture of Rehoboam; the meeting ended in the secession of the ten northern tribes, and Shechem, fortified by Jeroboam, became for a while the capital of the new kingdom (1 Kings 12:1; 14:17; 2 Chronicles 10:1).