High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The known history of Gaza spans 4,000 years. Gaza was ruled, destroyed and repopulated by various dynasties, empires, and peoples. Originally a Canaanite settlement, it came under the control of the ancient Egyptians for roughly 350 years before being conquered by the Philistines, who made it one of the principal cities of their pentapolis in the 12th century BCE. Gaza fell to the Israelite King David in about 1000 BCE and with the fall of the Kingdom of Israel in about 730 BCE, it became part of the Assyrian empire, and subsequently, that of the Persian Achaemenid Empire. Alexander the Great besieged the city for five months before finally capturing it in 332 BCE. Most of the inhabitants were killed during the assault, and the city, which became a center for Hellenistic learning and philosophy, was resettled by nearby Bedouin Arabs. The area changed hands regularly between two Greek successor-kingdoms, the Seleucids of Syria and the Ptolemies of Egypt. The city was besieged and taken by the Hasmoneans in 96 BCE.