I must put a further note here now that I have thought some more.

A) Highland settlements in Canaan, yes, they are there, although biblical scholars debate clearly if these are the Israelites.

1200 BCE, there is the Stella, which does not mention if it is these settlements.

C) This is not necessarily in line with the biblical Chronology, which of course has much different dates than modern archaeological lead chronology, I don't know where you get the idea.

Was there some group called the Israelites in 1200 BCE? yes. Was it in Canaan, maybe, the stella appears to group it with nations of that area, but it isn't concrete, and this has of course been debated.
Does marking this group as Israelites a people in the highlands of Canaan match with the strict biblical chronology or allow for the Israelites to have been slaves in Egypt, not really at all.

Were the Israelites a people? not really, they were a group of non-related tribes held together by a system of eponymous ancestors. Some will certainly be willing to debate that this did not occur until after the united monarchy came to power, or until the later divided monarchy.

Can we say the Israelites were the hill people of Canaan, it is one possiblity of many. Were the later Israelites, even those from as early as the united monarchy, genetically related, culturally tied, or religiously like the hill people or the Israelites from the writing of 1200 BCE? if yes, only in tentative ways that could easily tie these same individuals to Hittite, Egyptian, Jebusite, Edomite, and likely many other cultural/genetic/family groups.