The town is built adjacent to the biblical site of Tekoa (Hebrew: תְּקוֹעַ, romanized: Təqōaʿ; also called Thecoe), now Khirbet Tuqu', from which it takes its name.

[2] The town is a part of the 'Arab al-Ta'amira village cluster, along with Za'atara, Beit Ta'mir, Hindaza, Khirbet ad-Deir, Nuaman, Ubeidiya and al-Asakra.

Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, are illegal under international law.

[11] The people of Teqoa who returned from Babylon were Calebites (1 Chronicles 2:24), and they participated in rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem (Nehemiah 3:5,27).

These included the walls of houses, cisterns, broken columns and heaps of building stones, some of which had "bevelled edges" which supposedly indicated ancient Jewish origin.

[17] Less well represented are the Iron Age IIb, Persian, Early and Late Roman, and medieval (Crusader to Mamluk) periods.

[17] The Bible indicates Teqoa as the birthplace of prophet Amos, and from the 4th century CE on a tomb alleged to be his was said to be visible at the village.

[15] The ruins consist of a double cave over what was a baptismal font, mosaic floors; a Monophysite monastery is located near the tomb.

[12][19] When Victor Guérin visited the site in 1863, he described the remains of an almost completely destroyed church, and an octagonal baptismal font, carved into a monolithic block of reddish limestone, measuring a meter and ten centimeters deep inside, and one meter thirty centimeters in diameter.

[23] Outside Teqoa, adjacent to the Israeli settlement of Tekoa is Wadi Khureitun,[15] sometimes spelled Khreiton ("Chariton Valley").

[14] Medieval chronicler William of Tyre relates that the Christians of the village aided the Crusaders during the Siege of Jerusalem in 1099, by guiding them to local springs and food sources.

[25] In 1108, the Russian traveller Abbot Daniel noted that Casal Techue was "a very big village" with a mixed Christian and Muslim population.

[14] The village was granted by King Fulk and Queen Melisende to the canons of the Holy Sepulchre in 1138 in exchange for Bethany, the concession allowing the inhabitants to collect bitumen and 'salt' from the Dead Sea shores.

[14] The ruins of a castle, a Frankish manor house[14] from the period, are found at Khirbat at-Teqoa at the edge of the biblical and Byzantine archaeological mound, some 41x48x60 m in size, and protected by a rock-cut ditch.

He blamed the Templars' defeat on their failure to pursue fleeing Muslim forces which allowed them to regroup just outside Casal Techue.

[27] Syrian geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi described it as "a village famous for its honey" during a visit there in 1225,[15][28] during Ayyubid rule.

The villagers paid taxes on wheat, barley, olives, vines or fruit trees, and goats or beehives; a total of 27,000 akçe.

[19] French explorer Victor Guérin visited the place in 1863, and he described finding the scarce remains of a church, and an octagonal baptismal font.

[20] The PEF's Survey of Western Palestine in 1883 mentions that Khurbet Tequa "seems to have been large and important in Christian times.

[32] Over the years, Israel has confiscated 1,436 dunams of Teqoa's land for the construction of three Israeli settlements: Tekoa, Mitzpe Shalem, and a resort, Metzoke Dragot.

Principal clans include Badan, Jibreen, Sha'er, 'Emur, Nawawra, 'Urooj, Abu Mifrih, az-Zawahra, Sbeih, at-Tnooh, Sleiman and Sabbah.

Unemployment is high at about 50% and mostly caused by Israeli restrictions on movement and access to the labor market in Israel proper as a result of the Second Intifada between 2000 and 2004.

Originally, twelve tribal elders managed the town, but unable to plan and carry out internal improvements, they ceded their power to a council of younger men.