Therefore the poets say: Come to Heshbon, let it be rebuilt; let the city of Sihon be restored.For fire came out of Heshbon, a flame from the city of Sihon. It consumed Ar of Moab, the lords of Arnon’s heights.Woe to you, Moab! You have been destroyed, people of Chemosh! He gave up his sons as refugees, and his daughters into captivity to Sihon the Amorite king.We threw them down; Heshbon has been destroyed as far as Dibon. We caused desolation as far as Nophah, which reaches as far as Medeba.
The king’s edict gave the Jews in each and every city the right to assemble and defend themselves, to destroy, kill, and annihilate every ethnic and provincial army hostile to them, including women and children, and to take their possessions as spoils of war.