In addition, he had received the incorrect message that Antiochus Ephiphenes was dead. Jason was now fighting to take over the kingdom. This word got back to Antiochus. Imagine how Antiochus Ephiphenes felt after just having lost Egypt and now finding that people in Jerusalem were fighting over his kingdom, thinking he was dead in Egypt. He was so angry that he ordered his lead commander to destroy Jerusalem.
History records that they did just that.
They killed thousands of Jews taking many of them into slavery. They hacked and knocked over the porticoes in the Temple. They robbed many of the Temple vessels. On Kislev 25 in the year 168 BC, Antiochus marched into the Temple and built a statue in the outer courtyard to the god Zeus, the chief god in the Greek pantheon. He made the face of the statue of Zeus look like himself.