ISRAeLITe eMBASSIeS To ASSyRIA 177 paign of Adad-nirari III to the west that is recorded in the eponym chronicle. It seems to have followed a successful war against Damascus, recorded in the Saba’a Stele, and a prior defeat of Arpad, which led a coalition of north Syrian kings opposed to Assyria 5. This is the last interaction between Israel and Assyria recorded in the royal inscriptions until the submission of Menahem of Israel to Tiglath-Pileser III, sometime after 741 BCe. During much of the pe- riod between the submissions of Joash and Menahem, Jeroboam son of Joash reigned over Israel (790-749 BCe) 6. The biblical Book of kings records Jeroboam’s victory over Damascus and his extension of Israelite control to “Lebo of Hamath” (2 kings 13,25-28) 7. Scholars have speculated extensively about whether and how Israel coordinated with Assyria to achieve this impressive territorial expansion. Galil opined that “Assyria made its peace with this step by Israel and gave up on its attempts to renew its control of Aram-Damascus and Israel” 8. earlier, Cogan and Tadmor noted that the entries in the eponym chronicle show that Assyria did not abandon the West in the early eighth century, and “Jeroboam’s involvement as far as Hamath in central Syria could have come about only as a result of an explicit agreement or, at the least, a tacit understanding between Israel and Assyria, their common goal being to contain Damascus” 9. But no clear documentation indi- cating the nature of the relationship between Israel and Assyria in this period has been identified. 5 For the succession of events and their date, see SIDDALL, The Reign of Adad- Nirari III, 38-59, with references there to earlier discussions. 6 These dates follow GALIL, Israel and Assyria. Cogan and Tadmor (II Kings, 341) suggest 789-748. A.F. RAIney – S. noTLey, The Sacred Bridge (Jerusalem 2004) 217, argue for 793-753. For ease of reference, this article will follow Galil’s dates. The article refers to the whole period between 796 and 745; irrespective of the dates one accepts for Jeroboam son of Joash’s reign, virtually all this period falls within his reign. 7 Rainey identifies Lebo-Hamath as Labweh in the Lebanese Beqa’ (RAIney and noTLey, The Sacred Bridge, 217). 8 GALIL, Israel and Assyria, 48. 9 CoGAn – TADMoR, II Kings, 163. The eponym chronicle lists campaigns to Damascus in 773 and Hatarikka (Biblical Hadrach) in 772, 765, and 755; see A. MILLARD, The Eponyms of the Assyrian Empire 910-612 BC (State Archives of Assyria Studies 2; Helsinki 2011) 58-59. For a discussion of these campaigns, see D. kAHn, “Arpad and the Whole of Aram: The Policy of Arpad in 9th-8th Century B.C.e. Syria from the Time of Shalmaneser III (858 B.C.e.) to the Annexation of Arpad by Tiglath-Pileser III (740 B.C.e.)”, Ancient Near Eastern Studies 44 (2007) 66-89.