Skhul Cave, Archaeological site in Nahal Me'arot Nature Reserve, Israel.

Skhul Cave is an archaeological site and nature reserve on the Mediterranean coast of Israel, set into the limestone cliffs of Mount Carmel in the Haifa District. It is a rock shelter with several chambers where excavations uncovered human skeletons, stone tools, and animal bones.

Dorothy Garrod first excavated the cave in the summer of 1929, uncovering several Homo sapiens skeletons. Theodore D. McCown found most of the 14 skeletons recovered there in 1932. In 1939 Arthur Keith and McCown classified the Skhul and Qafzeh remains as Palaeoanthropus palestinensis, a descendant of Homo heidelbergensis.

The Arabic name, mġaret es-Skhūl, means "Young Goat Cave"; in Hebrew the site is Me'arat HaGedi. The cave lies in the Nahal Me'arot Nature Reserve with the Tabun, Jamal and El Wad caves, a national park and UNESCO World Heritage Site. Among the finds are two pierced Nassarius gibbosulus shell beads, 100,000 to 130,000 years old, counted among the oldest known jewellery.

The cave is reached through the Nahal Me'arot Nature Reserve, which has marked trails and information boards about the finds. Sturdy footwear is a good idea, as the rock surfaces inside can be uneven.

Some of the skeletons found at Skhul were buried with objects such as boar jaws and shell ornaments, suggesting deliberate burial rituals. This is one of the earliest known examples of symbolic behavior in our species.