This is the account of how Meqabis came upon the Jews in Mesopotamia of Syria and slew them in their region, from Iyabok all the way to the courts of Jerusalem, and destroyed the holy land of Gereg.
For from Samaria to the courts of Jerusalem and through all its surrounding districts they laid siege, and they slew with the edge of the sword until they left none remaining except a few; for the Edomites, the Syrians, and the Amalekites had joined with the Moabite Meqabis, who destroyed the city of Jerusalem.
And the Edomites and the Philistines encamped there and began to take vengeance upon the land of the Lord, for He Himself had sent them because the people had been false to the word of the Lord.
And they encamped in the regions of Gelabue of Mesopotamia, as far as Syria, to destroy the land of the Lord. From there he entreated the Philistines and the Amalekites, and he gave them much gold and silver, and horses and chariots, that they might be with him in his rebellion.
And they made Jerusalem like the booth of a keeper of a vineyard, and they wrought within it pollution and reproach and everything that the Lord does not delight in—the deeds of defilement; and they defiled the land of the Lord, which had been full of righteousness and holiness.
And they oppressed the widow and the orphan, and the unborn they ripped out of the wombs of women, until the Lord, who tries the heart and the reins, was provoked to anger; for without the fear of the Lord they acted, even as Satan had taught them.
And they returned to their own borders, rejoicing over the evil they had done against the people of the Lord, and they carried off the captives and the plunder which they had taken from the holy land.