Judah had taken advantage of the disturbed conditions in Israel to assert its independence.  The walls of Jerusalem were repaired by Jotham, father of Ahaz, and a tunnel constructed to supply it with water.  Isaiah refers to this tunnel:  “Go forth and meet Ahaz ... at the end of the conduit of the upper pool in the highway of the fuller’s field” (Isaiah, vii, 3).

Pekah had to deal with a powerful party in Israel which favoured the re-establishment of David’s kingdom in Palestine.  Their most prominent leader was the prophet Amos, whose eloquent exhortations were couched in no uncertain terms.  He condemned Israel for its idolatries, and cried: 

For thus saith the Lord unto the house of Israel, Seek ye me and ye shall live....  Have ye offered unto me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel?  But ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch and Chiun your images, the star of your god, which ye made to yourselves.[509]

Pekah sought to extinguish the orthodox party’s movement by subduing Judah.  So he plotted with Rezin, king of Damascus.  Amos prophesied,

Thus saith the Lord....  I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which will devour the palaces of Ben-hadad.  I will break also the bar of Damascus ... and the people of Syria shall go into captivity unto Kir....  The remnant of the Philistines shall perish.

Tyre, Edom, and Ammon would also be punished.[510] Judah was completely isolated by the allies who acknowledged the suzerainty of Damascus.  Soon after Ahaz came to the throne he found himself hemmed in on every side by adversaries who desired to accomplish his fall.  “At that time Rezin, king of Syria, and Pekah ...came up to Jerusalem to war:  and they besieged Ahaz, but could not overcome him."[511] Judah, however, was overrun; the city of Elath was captured and restored to Edom, while the Philistines were liberated from the control of Jerusalem.

Isaiah visited Ahaz and said,

Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither be faint-hearted for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin with Syria, and of the son of Remaliah.  Because Syria, Ephraim, and the son of Remaliah, have taken evil counsel against thee, saying, Let us go up against Judah, and vex it, and let us make a breach therein for us, and set a king in the midst of it, even the son of Tabeal:  Thus saith the Lord God, It shall not stand, neither shall it come to pass.[512]

The unstable Ahaz had sought assistance from the Baal, and “made his son to pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the heathen".[513] Then he resolved to purchase the sympathy of one of the great Powers.  There was no hope of assistance from “the fly that is in the uttermost part of the rivers of Egypt”, for the Ethiopian Pharaohs had not yet conquered the Delta region, so he turned to “the bee that is in the land of Assyria".[514] Assyria was the last resource of the king of Judah.