Ezekiel 11

One way of interpreting this is that the reason crooked city leaders don’t need to build homes is because they can confiscate homes they want and deny the former homeowners the right to live inside the walled city (compare this with Ezekiel 11:15, when they confiscate land). In modern times, the Israeli government has demolished homes and seized land of Palestinians living in East Jerusalem and in the West Bank. They have done so for a variety of reasons, including security pretexts, declaration of “state land,” and because homeowners lacked building permits for repairs and upgrades, when permits were notoriously difficult for Palestinians to get.

They’re getting double-dipped in punishment. First, God kicks them out of town. Second, invaders will kill them.

Some Bibles say judgment takes place “at the border.” But the Hebrew word gᵉbûl can also mean “territory,” “land,” or “country.” Some say they see in the “border” a reference to the Babylonian invaders executing Jerusalem leaders at the Syrian town of Riblah (2 Kings 25:20-21), north of Israel’s border. Riblah is today Rablah, Syria, about 200 miles (320 km) north of Jerusalem, as the crow flies. And it’s about 100 miles (160 km) north of Israel’s modern border.

The southern Jewish Kingdom of Judah was all that remained of the once united nation of Israel. The nation split after King Solomon died in about 930 BC. But Assyrians erased the northern Jewish Kingdom of Israel from the world map in 722 BC and deported the survivors. The people never came back from exile to rebuild their nation in the north. They became known as the Lost Tribes of Israel.

The picture of God leaving Jerusalem would have been a big deal for many in Israel. Some folks seemed to believe that God would never let invaders take his city and especially his Temple, considered his home on earth among his people. But God is sending the message that he is no longer sticking around to defend the Jews from the coming invaders. They are on their own. The Mount of Olives was the ridge of hills just east of Jerusalem, across the narrow Kidron Valley. Beyond those hills, the land dipped into the Jordan River Valley further east, about a day’s walk. Across the river lies the Arab nation of Jordan.