The Unyielding Land: History's Failed Conquests of Israel

In this series, we delve into the numerous attempts throughout history by various forces to conquer and inhabit the land of Israel — endeavors that ultimately ended in failure. Each conqueror was eventually forced to leave, and the land remained empty until the Jewish people returned to restore it.

The Torah, in the prophecy of the first exile found in Parashat Bechukotai, states: "Your enemies will inhabit it in desolation." This was because the land yearned for its Shabbats and the Sabbatical years that were not observed by the Israelites, thus becoming desolate for seventy years.

However, Ramban adds a hopeful note for us, declaring that the land of Israel does not accept our enemies. Despite their attempts, they have been unable to hold on.

During the second exile, enemies did manage to take root in Israel — some for a generation, some for several, but the outcome was always the same: the land rejected them.

Another prophecy in the Torah complements this narrative. In Parashat Nitzavim, the curse of the land is mentioned, describing a foreigner from a distant land observing its sulfur, salt, and emptiness. As it turned out, by the 19th century, in the final generation before the return, the land was almost completely barren.

The land underwent a process of decline. Indeed, since the fall of the Roman Empire, it was conquered by many: the Byzantines, Muslims, Persians, Crusaders, Mongols, Mamluks, Ottomans, Napoleon, and the British. Yet none succeeded in establishing a lasting population here, which defied the natural course of the world where cities and villages remain inhabited. By the 19th century, much of the land was desolate.

During the Roman period, the land supported millions. Contrary to the natural order, after two thousand years as a central and coveted land, only about 200,000 people remained at the start of the 19th century, concentrated in backward towns surrounded by wilderness and banditry.

The Byzantine period, extending from the fourth to the seventh century, followed the destruction, lasting after the fall of the Roman Empire, which adopted Christianity and thus morphed into the Byzantines.

Even after the Temple's destruction in the first century CE, most of the Jewish people remained in their homeland. Great sages like Rabbi Akiva and his students lived here. During the second century, the Bar Kochba revolt took place, leading to widespread destruction, yet the land remained home to the Israelites. Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai wrote the Mishnah, and leading sages like Rabbi Chiyya, Rabbi Yochanan, Resh Lakish, and their students flourished, keeping the yeshivas vibrant. Only in subsequent generations, during the time of Rabbi Judah the Nasi's great-grandchildren, did Byzantine persecutions intensify, diminishing the Jewish presence. Foreign peoples began to settle the land.

Then came the decline and abandonment. Cities were destroyed, and fertile lands turned barren. The Huns invaded in the fourth century, ravaging large portions of the land.

A letter to Emperor Constantine from Eusebius of Caesarea, a fourth-century bishop of Jerusalem, states: "The land appears desolate, villages and populations are absent. Trees do not bear fruit, and the soil does not yield crops."

A Bordeaux pilgrim in the mid-fourth century described: "We passed through a desolate land devoid of inhabitants, with only ruins as memories of past life."

Christian monk Jerome, in letters from his time in Bethlehem (fourth century), writes: "After all the devastation, the land looks like a desert, the earth is silent with no sounds of life."

By the fifth century, following the Byzantine recovery from Hun invasions, internal Christian conflicts arose, sparked by theological disputes, which weakened cooperation among rulers, causing commerce and agriculture to suffer.

In the sixth century, despite Christian unification, significant Samaritan revolts led to brutal suppressions and emigration. Central areas became desolate, lacking workers for the land.

Soon after, in the late sixth century, a period of natural disasters started: droughts, earthquakes, massive epidemics compared to the Black Death in Europe. Consequently, Byzantines failed to maintain their hold, and were defeated by the Muslims.