Contemporary with the Nubian Taharqa , the Assyrian King Sennacherib was governing the Assyrian Kingdom . When he was informed that
Egypt
was helping the Syrian and Palestinian states , he hurried with his troops towards the Palestinian coasts and after conquering them he marched upon Jerusalem . Jerusalem was well fortified and he was unable to conquer it . He then left a garrison to continue the siege and continued to Egypt . But along the way , the plague decimated his army and he had to return to Ninve .
In 676 BC , Esarhaddon invaded Egypt . A few years after the invasion , they sacked Thebes , the city of Egypt . Later in 671 BC , Esarhaddon , Sennachenb's son and the King of Assyria (680 BC-669 BC) defeated Taharqa's army , and captured
Memphis
. According to the record left by Esarhaddon , there was the siege and destruction of Memphis . Memphis was the capital of Egypt and the royal residence of Taharqa . Esarhaddon set out for a further campaign , but he got sick at Harran and died .
After Esarhaddon's death , Taharqa was given a chance to regain Memphis from Assyrians and to occupy it . But ,
in 667 (668) BC , Taharqa was kicked out of Memphis by Ashurbanipal (Esarhaddon's son and the King of Assyria who reigned from 668 to 627 BC) .
At the time of Ashurbaipal's Egyptian campaign , the power of Assyria was at its zenith , although one year after the death of Ashurbanipal in 627 BC , the Assyrians were severely beaten by the Babylonians , and their attempts to regain the lost land never succeeded . In 612 BC , Assyria collapsed , and this resulted in Egypt restoring independence of the Twenty-six Dynasty .
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