European states have been attempting to the draw a proverbial circle around the Turkish government in the eastern Mediterranean, much as Roman emissary C. Popillius Laenas did around Antiochus IV, the “King of the North” in Daniel 11, who ruled from modern-day Turkey (Original illustration by Tyson Ranes).

וּבָאוּ בוֹ צִיִּים כִּתִּים

The King of the North and Kittim

“The king of the north shall come and throw up siege works and take a well-fortified city. And the forces of the south shall not stand, or even his best troops, for there shall be no strength to stand. But he who comes against him shall do as he wills, and none shall stand before him. And he shall stand in the glorious land, with destruction in his hand. He shall set his face to come with the strength of his whole kingdom, and he shall bring terms of an agreement and perform them. He shall give him the daughter of women to destroy the kingdom, but it shall not stand or be to his advantage. Afterward he shall turn his face to the coastlands and shall capture many of them, but a commander shall put an end to his insolence. Indeed, he shall turn his insolence back upon him. Then he shall turn his face back toward the fortresses of his own land, but he shall stumble and fall, and shall not be found.

Then shall arise in his place one who shall send an exactor of tribute for the glory of the kingdom. But within a few days he shall be broken, neither in anger nor in battle. In his place shall arise a contemptible person to whom royal majesty has not been given. He shall come in without warning and obtain the kingdom by flatteries. Armies shall be utterly swept away before him and broken, even the prince of the covenant. And from the time that an alliance is made with him he shall act deceitfully, and he shall become strong with a small people. Without warning he shall come into the richest parts of the province, and he shall do what neither his fathers nor his fathers' fathers have done, scattering among them plunder, spoil, and goods. He shall devise plans against strongholds, but only for a time. And he shall stir up his power and his heart against the king of the south with a great army. And the king of the south shall wage war with an exceedingly great and mighty army, but he shall not stand, for plots shall be devised against him. Even those who eat his food shall break him. His army shall be swept away, and many shall fall down slain. And as for the two kings, their hearts shall be bent on doing evil. They shall speak lies at the same table, but to no avail, for the end is yet to be at the time appointed. And he shall return to his land with great wealth, but his heart shall be set against the holy covenant. And he shall work his will and return to his own land.

At the time appointed he shall return and come into the south, but it shall not be this time as it was before. For ships of Kittim shall come against him, and he shall be afraid and withdraw, and shall turn back and be enraged and take action against the holy covenant. He shall turn back and pay attention to those who forsake the holy covenant.”

- Daniel 11:15-30 (ESV)

All seemed lost for Ptolemy VI, king of Egypt, in the summer of 168 BC. From his palace in the capital of Alexandria, he could see the vast troop encampments and great warships of his uncle, Antiochus IV, surrounding the port city on every side. Dubbing himself “Epiphanes” (God manifest), but otherwise known as “Epimanes” (the Mad), Antiochus had come to demand territory and suzerainty from his sister’s son. It was not the first military confrontation between uncle and nephew, nor the first between the Greek kings of Syria and Egypt.

First century BC bust images of Antiochus III, The King of the North in Daniel 11:14-19 (Louve, Paris), and Cleopatra I, his daughter and mother of Ptolemy VI, the King of the South in Daniel 11:21- 30 (British Museum, London).

Antiochus’ father, Antiochus “the Great” III, had earned the honorific of his Greek predecessor Alexander, expanding the Seleucid empire southward through Syria and eastward to the Hindu Kush. The Greek Pharaoh Ptolemy V had “no strength to stand” against Antiochus as he swept down into Lebanon, and into “the Glorious Land, with destruction in his hand,” eventually forcing Ptolemy to accept the “terms of an agreement” to marry his daughter, Cleopatra I, “the daughter of women,” in the hopes of placing his kin on the throne of Egypt. After a century of political squabble and inconclusive military engagements, the balance of power between the Middle Eastern kings had swung decisively in the Syrian’s favor, so that “none could stand before him.” But as Antiochus “turned his face toward the coastlands,” claiming the Greek cities of Asia Minor (modern-day coastal Turkey) and “capturing many of them,” he found himself contending with a new power.

When Alexander the Great’s armies swept across the known world in the fourth century BC, the Republic of Rome did not yet even control its own peninsula. However, just 150 years later, the brilliant Roman general Scipio Africanus had secured not only Italy and Sicily, but the Mediterranean coasts of Spain, Corsica and Tunisia. Having already subdued Alexander’s heir, Philip V of Macedonia, the Roman Senate was concerned about a power vacuum in Greece which Antiochus III might exploit in a bid to challenge them. Therefore, the chief strategy of Rome in the Near East was to preserve the status quo, maintaining a balance of power between the Syrian and Egyptian kingdoms.

When Antiochus III crossed the Dardanelles Strait onto the European continent, he was met by the legions of Rome, in league with the city-states of Greece and Asia Minor. The Romans routed Antiochus and “put an end to his insolence,” pushing him back into Asia, decimating his fleet, and forcing him to “turn his face back toward the fortresses of his own land.” Finally, the Syrian king was forced to sign a treaty with Rome in 188 BC which relinquished his claims in the West, downsized his military, and sent his young son Antiochus IV to Rome as a hostage. The senators and proconsuls of Rome, rather than the emperors of Antioch and Alexandria, had become the regulatory power in the Middle East.

*A contemporary bust of Antiochus IV “Epiphanes,” the King of the North in Daniel 11:21-30 at the Altes museum in Berlin.*

The young Antiochus spent a decade in captivity, during which time he grew to regard the customs of Rome, especially its politics. After the death of his father and the ascension of his elder brother to the throne, Antiochus was exchanged for the new king’s son and heir. He remained in Greece, outside of the Seleucid Empire, until his brother was suddenly assassinated by a usurper. While the crown prince was still a Roman captive, Antiochus seized the opportunity for power. The “contemptible man,” employed the political finesse he had learned in Rome, to “make an alliance by flatteries” with the “small people” of the Greek city-state of Pergamon in Asia Minor. Antiochus arrived with an invasion force “without warning, into the richest parts of the province” of Syria, seizing his brother’s kingdom back from the usurper while “scattering among [the invaders] plunder, spoil, and goods.” Although “royal majesty had not been given” to Antiochus, he “acted deceitfully,” declaring himself co-regent with his slain brother’s infant son, while plotting to eventually take the throne for himself.

Just five years later, Antiochus IV ordered his young nephew assassinated, consolidating his hold over the Seleucid dynasty. The guardians of young Ptolemy VI of Egypt demanded the return of the lands taken by Antiochus’ father and raised an “exceedingly great and mighty army” to “wage war.” But the King of the North was prepared. The Syrian army swept down and crushed the Egyptians, capturing the young King of the South. Eager to maintain the favor of Rome, Antiochus left his sister’s son on the throne of Egypt to maintain the illusion of status quo; but Ptolemy had become a mere puppet of his uncle. Secretly, “plots were devised” by some in the royal court to install a rival monarch–Ptolemy’s own brother–over a divided kingdom in Egypt, so that “even those who ate [Ptolemy’s] food did break him.”

Antiochus withdrew from Egypt “to return to his own land,” leaving his nephews in a tenuous peace. But rather than forming a rivalry, the Ptolemaic brothers came to an accord. The elder Ptolemy VI was declared sole ruler of Egypt once again, with the consent of his brother, and immediately appealed to Rome for aid. Antiochus was furious. He sent his fleet to capture Cyprus from his nephew and mustered his army. Once again, the King of the North invaded Egypt, and once again, his forces surrounded the capital of Alexandria. Convinced of a second victory and determined to break the neck of the Ptolemaic Dynasty, Antiochus’ demands were much more severe. But “this time,” events would not go in his favor “as it was before.” Rome had received Ptolemy’s plea for aid, and the “ships of Kittim” had sailed to confront the Seleucid King.

*Seleucid emperor Antiochus IV, Roman emissary C. Popillius Laenas, and the famous circle, by Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée (1724-1805)*

To his surprise, Antiochus was met near Alexandria by Gaius Popillius Laenas, the envoy of Rome, who delivered the demand of the Roman Senate for Antiochus to withdraw immediately. Antiochus was taken aback and requested to consult with his advisors, but the Roman would not relent. Drawing a circle in the sand around the Syrian king, Laenas demanded a response before Antiochus stepped out of it. The once-haughty King of the North was suddenly chastened, fearful of repeating his father’s mistake in provoking Rome to war. He agreed to withdraw his forces and return to the north. Just as the “ships of Kittim” had turned his father back twenty years before, so now Antiochus found himself outmatched by the same rival. But the worst was yet to come.

The Origins of Kittim

Moses introduced the man and nation of Kittim in the Torah narrative. After the Great Flood, Noah’s son Japheth was the father of Javan, who in turn was the father of Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim. Together, these four brothers and their father were the progenitors of a significant portion of “the coastland peoples spread in their lands” around the Mediterranean basin. [1] The Javanites settled around the coast of the Aegean Sea, in modern Greece and Western Turkey, while the Dodanim (a.k.a Rhodanim) settled on the Greek island of Rhodes. The nations of Elishah and Kittim settled on the island of Cyprus, where the port city of Kition became a center of Mediterranean trade. The settlement of the nation of Tarshish is less clear, with some ancient historians placing Tarshish in Asia Minor, and others as far-flung as coastal Spain.

A map of the Mediterranean region showing the settlement of the Javanite “coastland peoples” around the Aegean Sea, Cyprus, and the northern rim of the Mediterranean, according to the Table of Nations (Genesis 10)

However, the Biblical narrative is less concerned about the exact geographical locations around which the “coastland peoples” settled and more concerned with their relative position to the “Glorious Land.” Javan, Kittim and Tarshish are often described as the seafaring nations who sail from the westward extremities of the “Great Sea.” Through the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah, the Lord describes Kittim as the western edge of the known world. [2] Through Isaiah, He promises a “time…to gather all nations and tongues [to] come and see my glory,” including “Javan, to the coastlands far away.” [3] The port of Kition was on the southeast corner of the island of Cyprus, making it the closest point of reference for the Hebrew prophets in the “Glorious Land.” In that sense, all of the Javanite ships which sailed from Cyprus and further West could rightly be called the “ships of Kittim.”

An ancient fresco discovered on the Greek island of Thera (today Santorini) in the Aegean Sea, depicting the seafaring commerce of the Minoans, the earliest Greek civilization, active around the same time as the Exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt (1500 BC).

The prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel describe Javan, Kittim and Tarshish as enterprising nations which traded with the Phoenicians of Tyre and Sidon, coastal cities to the north of Israel in modern Lebanon. [4] They trafficked in precious metals, wares, and even human beings, including Hebrew captives, for which they were rebuked by the prophet Joel. [5] But their commercial interests suffered loss when the empires of Assyria, Babylon and Persia successively conquered the Middle East, and the “coastland peoples” eventually resorted to military intervention. The final oracle of Balaam establishes a prophetic role for the seafaring nations in Numbers 24:24,

“Ships will come from the coasts of Kittim; they will subdue Asshur and Eber [the Semitic peoples of the Middle East], but they too will perish forever.”

Balaam’s words were portended in history several times by successive waves of European intervention in the Near East, beginning with the lightning campaign of Alexander’s armies in the fourth century BC that claimed the entire known world from Asia Minor to Egypt, and from the Caucus to India. The deuterocanonical book of 1 Maccabees refers to Alexander as hailing “from the land of Kittim.”[6] Then came the conquests of Pompey and Octavian just decades before the birth of Jesus, placing the Middle East under the rule of Roman emperors for almost four centuries. The “ships of Kittim” came in the eleventh century AD, filled with European Crusaders who briefly ruled the Promised Land for a century, and again in the early twentieth century, when the Allied powers arrived to invade and dismantle the Ottoman caliphate, dividing the Mideast into British and French protectorates.

*Detail of a 15th-century tapestry depicting the banners of Crusaders embarking for the Holy Land.*

However, each time Asshur and Eber were “subdued,” it was only for a time. The Roman heirs in Constantinople were eventually driven out of Asia by successive Arab and Turkish caliphates. The great Kurdish caliph Salahuddin took Jerusalem and most of the Land of Israel back from the Crusaders. Arab and Turkish nationalism in the twentieth century brought an end to European colonialism. More recently, Western military invasions in Afghanistan and Iraq have ended ignominiously. Each cycle of intervention and conquest has resulted in eventual withdrawal. The “ships of Kittim” hold sway in the Near East for a while, but the Middle East proves untamable. Eventually, indigenous kingdoms arise to reclaim power in the region. And now, a century after the Mideast map was redrawn by Europe, the old older is slowly crumbling under the weight of popular revolution, and newfound riches in the sea are drawing the “ships of Kittim” back to the Eastern Mediterranean.

The Return of the Ships of Kittim

In December 2000, in an effort to become more energy independent, the State of Israel granted British energy company BG Group a license for offshore oil and natural gas exploration. Experts predicted huge reserves in the so-called “Levant Basin” between the coasts of Cyprus, Egypt and Israel. Nine years later, US-based Noble Energy found natural gas deposits just 80 kilometers (50 miles) off the coast of Haifa. Measuring 200 billion cubic meters, the Tamar offshore gas field was the largest ever found in the Eastern Mediterranean, but it was just the beginning. The following year, drilling 130 kilometers off the coast, the Leviathan field was discovered, containing over 600 billion cubic meters of proven gas deposits. Then in 2015, Italian energy giant Eni discovered a massive natural gas field off the coast of Egypt. Measuring over 100 square kilometers, the Zohr deposit is almost twice as large as the Leviathan discovery, and the largest in the entire Mediterranean. Energy companies from the United States, Israel, France, Britain, Italy and even Australia rushed in, signing lucrative contracts with the Israeli and Egyptian governments. The discovery of gas in the Eastern Mediterranean changed the calculus of Middle Eastern economics, which had been dominated by oil for a century. The enterprising “ships of Kittim” had returned, except they did not carry fortunes over the sea as in centuries past, but to drill for fortune under it.

*Drilling rig and ships belonging to US-based Noble Energy, off the coast of Cyprus (via ksapre.com).*

The new economic boon in the Eastern Mediterranean also reinvigorated old rivalries in the region – namely, the rivalry between Turkey and the Greek-speaking nations around it. The Greek-majority island of Cyprus began to explore its territorial waters for energy sources. According to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, each coastal nation is entitled to an “exclusive economic zone” (EEZ) extending 200 nautical miles from its shoreline. Nations which have overlapping EEZ’s are expected to conclude a treaty that stipulates an equitable maritime border. Cyprus negotiated such a treaty with the nation of Lebanon in 2007, just 264 kilometers away (164 miles). Turkey is even closer, at only 71 kilometers (44 miles) from the north shores of Cyprus, but the island nation has no maritime agreement with the Turkish government, as Turkey has never joined the UN maritime convention, and it has refused to recognize Cyprus as a sovereign nation for almost 50 years. The northern one-third of Cyprus is still occupied by the Turkish army since an invasion in 1974, preserving a breakaway region of Turkish Cypriots known as the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), which is not recognized as a legitimate republic by any nation except Turkey.

In 2011, US-based Nobile Energy found modest natural gas deposits in the Aphrodite fields inside the Cypriot EEZ. Shell Oil and Exxon Mobil soon signed contracts with Cyprus, as well as Italian, French, Russian, British and Israeli energy firms. Threatened by the sudden advantage of his rival, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan took what he called “reciprocal action” and worked with Turkish Cyprus to create its own EEZ, much of which overlapped with the EEZ of Greek Cyprus. Although the TRNC is not recognized as a national entity, Turkey nonetheless had its pretext to begin natural gas exploration in Cypriot waters alongside Western corporations. It was only a matter of time before the “ships of Kittim” came into tension with the ships of the King of the North.

A map of the eastern Mediterranean Sea showing the gas fields in the Levant Basin, the members states of the Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum (forerunner to the EMGO), as well as conflicting Turkish and Greek Cypriot claims to the extended economic zone of Cyprus (Geopolitical Futures, via almonitor.com)

In February 2018, a drilling ship belonging to Italian energy firm Eni was sailing to its assigned section of the Cypriot EEZ when it was suddenly intercepted by Turkish warships, and eventually forced to return to port. The Turkish navy would repeat the stunt with an Israeli research vessel the following year. Then in May 2019, Turkish ship Fatih 1 began drilling in the Cypriot EEZ, enraging the government of Cyprus, a member of the European Union, and prompting the EU to sanction Turkey for its “illegal” activity. When the six nations of Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Egypt, Israel and Jordan formed the Eastern Mediterranean Gas Organization (EMGO) in 2020, striking multi-billon Euro deals for a vast network of gas pipelines between Israel and Italy, Turkey was left out. Erdogan struck back by signing a bilateral maritime agreement with the government in Libya’s capital of Tripoli, which was under threat from the Egyptian-sponsored rival government in the East and benefitted greatly from Turkish military aid. The maritime corridor between Turkey and Libya cut a swath through the EEZ’s of Greece and Cyprus, coming dangerously close to the shores of the island of Crete.

A European Union proposed natural gas pipeline that would run between Israel, Cyprus, Greece and Italy. Turkey’s maritime agreement with the Libyan government in Tripoli cuts through the path of the proposed line between Cyprus and Crete (via iene.eu).

Although the overlapping interests and political tension in the Eastern Mediterranean have yet to erupt into a military crisis, Turkey’s program of aggressive expansion on both land and sea make confrontation with the European Union increasingly likely. In Libya, Syria, Iraqi Kurdistan and Armenia, Turkish military interventionism is alarming, with French president Emmanuel Marcon criticizing Turkish president Erdogan for his “dangerous” and “warlike” rhetoric. Whether drilling for gas illegally in the Eastern Mediterranean, threatening a tidal wave of Middle Eastern refugees onto the European continent, or destabilizing the Middle East with its network of Syrian mercenaries, the Turkish government has begun to flex its power across the region and tip the balance of power. And as we have already learned, the goal of the “ships of Kittim” is to maintain the balance of power in the Near East for the sake of their economic interests, now focused on Mediterranean energy. European states have been attempting to draw a proverbial circle around the Turkish government in the eastern Mediterranean, much as the Roman emissary drew a literal circle around Antiochus IV. Diplomatic isolation and economic sanctions have become the lines in the sand around the modern-day predecessor to the King of the North. It is only a matter of time and circumstance before these opposing trajectories escalate into a collision.

The Coming Battle with the Ships of Kittim

Daniel 11 not only narrates an episode of history, it also prophesies an eschatological showdown between modern iterations of the same geographical players. The Turkish city of Antakya sits near the ruins of Antioch, the ancient seat of Antiochus IV, the King of the North. Alexandria is still found on the coast of the nation of Egypt, where the Ptolemies ruled as the Kings of the South. The nations of Javan, Kittim and Tarshish, the European-majority islands and coastal nations along the Mediterranean, are once again dispatching their ships to the Eastern Mediterranean to do commerce.

*Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan is intent on disrupting EU-Arab-Israeli energy cooperation in the Eastern Mediterranean (Getty Images).*

As Egypt and other Arab states continue to fight wars by proxy with Turkey in Libya, and as Turkish ships continue to infringe on Israeli and European interests around Cyprus, a series of future wars is prophesied between these players. Eventually, a “contemptible person” will arise within the territory of the old Seleucid Empire. He will raise a “great army” to wage war against the “great and mighty army” of the King of the South, the southern Arab states, and shall subdue them. Stoking political and religious divisions in Egypt, as his predecessors have already done in Syria, Libya, Iraq and Armenia, he will “speak lies” at the same table, while his heart is bent on war. When the King of the North eventually returns to overtake Egypt again, it “shall not be like it was before.” The “ships of Kittim shall come against him, and he shall be afraid and withdraw.” Even now, we see the European Union beginning to assert itself in league with the Arab Coalition against Turkish hegemony, as France, Greece, Egypt and the UAE have formed a military partnership. The King of the North will eventually test the cooperation of his rivals, and after achieving an initial victory which emboldens him to further action, the “ships from Kittim” will stop him in his tracks, and he will “turn back.”

*The Beast from the Sea, Luther’s Bible, 1534 Edition*

As we already see modern geopolitical lines being traced along the eschatological frame, one Mideast and Mediterranean player comes into sharp focus. Israel has been at the forefront of natural gas development in the Mediterranean from the beginning, forming ties with Arab and European partners alike. The recent Abraham Accords of 2020 placed the Jewish State on a path of diplomatic normalization and economic cooperation with the Arab nations that encompass the ancient Ptolemaic Empire. When the King of the North eventually subdues the southern nations and is confronted by Europe, he will “turn back” in a rage and “take action” against the covenant nation which allied itself with his enemies. Suddenly and without warning, “forces from him shall appear and profane the temple and fortress” in Jerusalem, initiating a “time of trouble, such as never has been since there was a nation till that time.” And so, the eschatological King of the North shall continue in fulfillment of the prophecy beyond his ancient forerunner. Carried along by satanic empowerment, the King of the North will “do as he wills” and shall “prosper until the indignation is accomplished.” Attempts by Arab and European states to halt his advance will be futile, as he shall “come into countries and overflow and pass through” for a “time, times, and half a time.” The “land of Egypt will not escape,” the “Libyans and Cushites [Sudanese] will follow in his train,” and as Balaam prophesied, “Ships will come from the coasts of Kittim…but they too will perish forever.”

*A ninth century depiction of Jesus defeating the dragon and the Beast (Stuttgart Psalter, fol. 23, illustration of Psalm 91:13).*

The King of the North’s campaign of conquest will seem unstoppable. The nations will rightly ask, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?" [5] In the end, no human deliverance will arrive from the West or East. Salvation for the covenant people will not come on ships from Kittim, but on clouds from the sky. Judgements shall fall, the Euphrates River shall dry up, and demonic spirits will be sent out to “go abroad to the kings of the whole world, to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty.” Reports “from the east and the north” will alarm the King of the North, and he shall make his stand “between the sea and the glorious mountain” on the Plains of Megiddo. With the nations gathered from East and West for war, the Rider on the White Horse will appear to break them all with an iron rod.

The King of the North will “come to his end, with none to help him” as the King of Kings takes the throne of his father David, securing the covenant forever.