Kh. el-Maqatir is upper left; et-Tell is right center

One mile (1.6 km) due west of traditional Ai (et-Tell) is Kh. el-Maqatir, an alternate location for Ai. Its location fits the approximate area one would expect to find the city that Joshua destroyed in the Conquest. Furthermore, the absence of any evidence of inhabitation at et-Tell should compel the honest historian to look elsewhere for Ai.

If Kh. el-Maqatir were to prove to be Ai archaeologically, its location fits the biblical record well. The deep Wadi Sheban to the west provides a perfect location for the ambush forces of the Israelites to hide. Joshua’s command post was on the hill just east (left) of the modern road and he fled east away from the wadi allowing the ambush force to attack from behind.

Separated from the north by a deep valley, Khirbet el-Maqatir is here seen from the eyes of Joshua at his camp before attacking the city. To date, much evidence has been found indicating that Kh. el-Maqatir is the Ai of Joshua’s day, including the city fortifications, gate, evidence of battle and destruction by fire.

Byzantine monks built a large monastery on the site in the 4th century AD that may help in the identification of this site as Ai. The earliest reports by Edward Robinson (1838) show that the local peoples thought Kh. el-Maqatir was Ai and it is possible that this church preserved the memory of this identification.