Ba'al literally means "Lord" in the Northwest Semitic languages of the Levant, including Phoenician where the word is rendered as 𐤁𐤏𐤋. The title referred to several Canaanite deities, most notably Ba'al Hadad and Ba'al Hammon, the latter being the supreme deity of Carthage with his consort Tanit . Hannibal's name, meaning "Ba'al (Lord) is Gracious", likely refers to Ba'al Hammon in particular. The Phoenicians wrote about their own mythology, most notably by the semi-legendary Sanchuniathon (𐤎𐤊𐤍𐤉𐤕𐤍) of Beirut, but the original text does not survive, and is only paraphrased in Greek by Philo of Byblos. These Ugaritic texts were written on clay tablets and were found near the ancient city of Ugarit in the 1920s. Much of our knowledge of Canaanite mythology, and by extension Phoenician mythology, comes from these texts. Summary of the Baʿal Cycle: ‣ Yam wants to rule over the other gods and be the most powerful of all ‣ Baʿal Hadad opposes Yam and slays him ‣ Baʿal Hadad, with the help of Anath and Athirat, persuades El to allow him a palace ‣ Baʿal Hadad commissions Kothar-wa-Khasis to build him a palace. ‣ King of the gods and ruler of the world seeks to subjugate Mot ‣ Mot kills Baʿal Hadad ‣ Anath brutally kills Mot, grinds him up and scatters his ashes ‣ Baʿal Hadad returns to Mount Saphon ‣ Mot, having recovered from being ground up and scattered, challenges Baʿal Hadad ‣ Baʿal Hadad refuses; Mot submits ‣ Baʿal Hadad rules again Yam (𐤅𐤌) was the Canaanite god of the sea and rivers; Mot (𐤌𐤕) was the Canaanite god of death and the underworld; and El (𐤀𐤋) is a generic word meaning "god" or "deity", but he also played a role as the father of the gods or of creation. More on reddit.com

I believe Baal comes from the Punic pantheon (around Carthage and thereabouts?), and may have just been a title as opposed to a name of one specific Deity. There were several Baals in the religion, and it seems unclear whether they were aspects of one entity or different beings. I think the word was supposed to mean "king" or "chief," so would have been used to differentiate your "head honcho" masculine gods, similar to Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades. I don't think the child sacrifice, or human sacrifice, thing has been fully substantiated archaeologically. From what I recall, there is some tentative evidence that this may have been a thing in some specific iterations of the broader culture at certain points in history, but it's also quite possible that these connections are made through the lens of confirmation bias, working backwards from the stories. I think there were some bones in some jars that were stored in some certain way, and that's about it. Kind of hard to draw CSI quality conclusions from millennia old remains. Of course, it's possible that human sacrifice was a thing. It was a thing in a lot of places, presumably mostly during periods of time when a given population became driven to desperation in the face of some looming or ongoing catastrophe. Even Yahweh once asked Abraham to do it ... and then, as we all know, went "psyche, that was just a prank bro, you should have seen the look on your face!" In general, I think there's a bit of a paucity when it comes to concrete archaeological evidence of specific Punic religious practices, so unless the smoking ceremonial dagger turns up, we seem to mostly have stories from rival cultures to go on, which is not the most reliable source. Either way, it seems that Baal was basically just a normal god, insofar as gods are normal. More like Zeus (probably still a terrible role model in many of the stories) and less like some sort of monstrous demonic entity. Honestly, even if some priests did decide to sacrifice people to their god in desperation, I wouldn't necessarily blame the god. Those tend to reflect back at us what we want or expect to see. More on reddit.com

The entire book of Judges is about God being angry with Israel for associating Him with pagan deities since all the way back at Sinai, and this argument continues through the rest of the Old Testament until Israel is punished with defeat by Assyria and Babylon. I would be more surprised if archaeologies didn't find pottery and idols with combinations of YHWH and Canaanite gods, and it's interesting to me that YHWH is commonly treated as their "God of War" when most interactions the common people had after rebelling was being rescued by Him from occupations/raids. More on reddit.com

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