In the days of Pekah king of Israel, King Tiglath-pileser of Assyria invaded and captured Ijon, Abel-beth-maacah, Janoah, Kedesh, Hazor, Gilead, and Galilee—all the region of Naphtali, and he deported them to Assyria.
In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria and deported the Israelites to Assyria. He placed them in Halah and Habor, on the Gozan River, and in the towns of the Medes.
No longer will I cause the feet of Israel to wander from the land which I gave their fathers—if only they will keep doing all I have commanded them and the whole Torah that My servant Moses commanded them.”
Adonai said, “I will banish Judah also from My presence as I banished Israel, and I have spurned this city, Jerusalem, which I chose, and the House about which I had said: ‘My Name will be there.’”
So the God of Israel stirred up the spirit of King Pul of Assyria—the spirit of Tillegath-pilneser king of Assyria—and he carried away the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh, and brought them to Halah, Habor, Hara and to the river of Gozan, to this day.
You bore with them for many years and admonished them by Your Ruach through the hand of Your prophets. Yet they would not listen, so You handed them over to the peoples of the lands.
The king of Assyria sent the Rab-shakeh from Lachish to Jerusalem to King Hezekiah with a massive army. The Rab-shakeh stood by the aqueduct of the upper pool in the highway of the washer’s field.
For before the child will have knowledge to cry ‘my father!’ or ‘my mother!’ the wealth of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria will be carried away before the king of Assyria.”
Thus says Adonai: “For three crimes of Israel even for four, I will not relent. For they sell the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of shoes.