[10][11] The assassin was Zimri a high-ranking officer, "commander of half the chariot troop" (a military form used in Israel since the time of Solomon, cf.

[12] Zimri was 'the most spectacularly unsuccessful king of all' rulers in Israel and Judah as his suicide ended his seven-day reign.

[19] Omri's name was not of Israelite, but might be of Arabian origin; perhaps he worked his way to be an army general and then a head of state because of his 'unusually charismatic personality'.

[20] He founded a dynasty in northern Israel with great significance to the political development of the country, as possibly becoming the only true state at that time.

[10] Archaeological studies have discovered a great amount of building from the period of this dynasty (the ninth century BCE) across the entire land: city walls and fortifications, administration centres etc., whereas non-biblical sources from Assyria, Aram, and Moab indicate 'reluctant respect' for the power and influence of Israel at the time of Omri's dynasty (Assyrian records refer to Israel as "the land of the house of Omri").

[20] Samaria (later Sebaste) was geopolitically and strategically well situated and could be built without taking larger, existing structures into account.

[10] Ahab was considered as 'evil in the sight of the Lord more than all who were before him', especially as he married the Phoenician princess Jezebel, built a temple for Baal (the classic Canaanite fertility god, responsible for nature's rebirth) in Samaria, and erected a cult symbol for the goddess Asherah (the mother goddess of the Canaanite pantheon who stands at El's, Baal's, or even Yahweh's side, presumably symbolized by some wooden object such as a stylized tree).

Jezebel's father's name: Ethbaal), although Ahab's action 'must have been driven by the need to appease the religious influence of Israel's urban Canaanite population', because Bethel and Dan were mainly Israelite Yahweh-worshipping sites (cf.