So we know the wall of Jericho existed, and we can make a pretty good guess that it was the first walled city in the history of mankind, but is there any good proof that it was magically destroyed, or for that matter destroyed by people?
There were many walled cities.
The veracity of the Biblical account is called into question by radio-dating, which indicates that at the time the battle took place according to Biblical chronology, Jericho was already deserted.
A man named Albright was a US archeaology professor and rabidly fanatical christian who attempted to prove the veracity of the "bible" by locating the cities named in the Exodus Trilogy that were destroyed.
He failed. Terribly. Quite miserably.
Of the 16 cities the "bible" claims the Israelites destroyed, only three cities support the biblical accounts: Bethel, Lachish and Hazor
To make matters worse, there is no direct evidence the Israelites destroyed those three cities. In my opinion, there is sufficient circumstantial evidence to indicate the Israelites probably did destroy one of them.
Seven of the cities claimed to have been destroyed show absolutely no evidence of destruction, or were not occupied at the time of the "Exodus" and it doesn't matter if you pine for the early Exodus date or the late Exodus date (those seven cities include Jericho, Ai and Gibeon.
Six of the cities have not been located to date.
The "bible" also mentions 12 other cities that were not destroyed. Of those, five have been identified and show no signs of destruction. The others either have not been found or have not shown sufficient evidence to suggest that they were or were not destroyed.
During the search and excavations, 12 other cities from roughly the same timer period were located. Those 12 cities were not named in the "bible" (and a few have not been fully identified). Of those 12 unnamed cities, six of them are known to have been destroyed by either the Egyptians, or by various groups collectively known as the Sea Peoples.
The other six cities show evidence of destruction, but no definite time period has been established and there is no evidence to identify the invader.
One of the interesting things about these excavations is that it was discovered that it is virtually impossible to tell the difference between a city occupied by the Israelites and a city occupied by Canaanites.
Their cultures are so similar as to be indistinguishable. That, along with the "biblical" evidence leads me to conclude the "Exodus" never happened.
There was a wall around it dating back to 8000 B.C.
I'm not so sure about that. Jericho was originally a small trading post, before it began slowly expanding in size over the next several thousand years. The archaeology reviews I was reading made no mention of a wall.
