9. "May our master listen to our advice, and your army won’t suffer any losses.
10. These people, the Israelites, don’t rely on their spears but on the height of the hills where they live, because it isn’t easy to climb up to their hilltops.
11. Therefore, Master, don’t fight them in the usual way, and not one of your men will fall.
12. Instead, wait in your camp, keeping all the men of your army there, and let your servants seize the spring of water that flows out from the base of the hill,
13. because this is the water source for all those who live in Bethulia. Thirst will be their undoing, and it will force them to surrender their city. In the meantime, we and our people will go up to occupy the tops of the nearby hills and set up guard, to make sure that no man leaves the city.
14. Then they, their wives, and their children will wither with hunger in the streets where they live before a sword even comes near them.
15. Thus you will repay them with evil because they rebelled and didn’t welcome you peacefully."
16. Their plan pleased Holofernes and his advisors, and he directed them to do as they had said.
17. So the Ammonites together with five thousand Assyrians moved their camp to the valley and seized the Israelite water supply and springs.
18. Meanwhile, the Edomites and the Ammonites went up and camped in the highlands opposite Dothan and sent some of their men to the south and the east to Egrebeh, which is near Chusi, beside the Mochmur ravine. The rest of the Assyrian army camped on the plain and covered the whole countryside, and their tents and baggage stretched out over a vast encampment. They were indeed a very great multitude.
19. The Israelites cried out to the Lord their God, for their spirits were low, because their enemies had completely surrounded them, and no escape was in sight.
20. The whole Assyrian army remained around them, the infantry and chariots and cavalry, for thirty-four days until the water supplies of everyone who lived in Bethulia ran dry.
21. Their reservoirs were nearly empty, and because drinking water was being rationed, on no day did anyone have enough to drink.
22. Their children were discouraged, and the women and young men fainted from thirst in the city streets, collapsing at the entrance to the gates. They had no strength left.