From the Exodus to the destruction of the First Temple, Israel was exiled eight times. According to the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, a 12th-century Hebrew chronicle translated by Moses Gaster in 1899, four of those exiles were carried out by Sennacherib, king of Assyria, and four by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon. Together they stripped the land bare.
Sennacherib's first campaign seized the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh. He also captured the golden calf that Jeroboam had placed in Dan, which these tribes had turned into a private sanctuary. For this idolatry they were exiled to Lahlah, Habor, the river Gozan, and the cities of Media. The second exile took the tribes of Asher, Zebulun, Naphtali, and Issachar, who had refused to accept Hosea ben Elah as king. The third swept away the remaining people of Samaria, ending the northern kingdom forever.
Sennacherib then turned toward Jerusalem itself. He sent his general Rabshakeh with 180,000 soldiers. But Hezekiah prayed, and Isaiah prophesied deliverance. That night, the angel of the Lord struck down the entire Assyrian camp. Only Sennacherib survived, and he fled home in disgrace, where his own sons murdered him.
Nebuchadnezzar's four exiles finished what Sennacherib started. He deported Jehoiakim, then Jehoiachin along with 10,000 of Judah's elite, then laid siege to Jerusalem under Zedekiah and burned the Temple to the ground. His final campaign swept through Egypt, killing every Jew found in Ammon, Moab, and the surrounding regions. When Jeremiah saw that scarcely any Israelites remained, he begged God to take his life. A voice answered: "Wait. Behold the downfall of Babylon. Afterward I shall preserve you until I build the everlasting building." Then God hid the prophet away.