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KINGS OF THE JEWS 76 JEHOAHAZ 813–797 BCE Despite his crusading zeal—though more likely because of it—the warrior king Jehu had inflicted such damage to the fortunes of Israel that the kingdom was doomed to further decline when he died and was succeeded on the throne by his son, Jehoahaz. In the climate of unrest and land grabbing that blanketed the entire region at the time, a strong, well-equipped army was essential for a nation’s security. But the once-formidable Israelite army, having been thrashed by the forces of Damascus , dwindled to a size capable only of repelling raiders who attempted to seize Samaria. Had the capital been situated in a less impregnable, less elevated position , it probably would have been conquered, and Israel would have been extinguished as an independent state. Six decades earlier, it had sent two thousand chariots to help challenge the might of the rampaging Assyrians. Now it could field only ten chariots in an armed force limited to ten thousand foot soldiers and fifty horsemen—more a police force than an army. Only when it became necessary for Damascus to divert occupying forces to resist Assyrian aggression against its own territory was the pressure relaxed on the Israelites, though not sufficiently to permit more than a marginal respite from Israel’s misfortune. Damascus had already annexed most of the northern kingdom and was still in a position to demand tribute from the rest. During Jehoahaz’s reign, Israel was a weak, virtually defenseless, impoverished rump of a nation, most of whose people were subjected to foreign oppression. Its king displayed none of his father’s zeal for religious purification, nor it seems for anything else. He made little personal impact on the land or his subjects. ...

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