How has the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger! He has cast down from heaven to the earth the beauty of Israel, And hasn't remembered his footstool in the day of his anger.
Again the writer pictures the heartbreaking scene in besieged Jerusalem, with starving people crying out to God for mercy. Some even kill their own children for food (18-20). As pilgrims flock to Jerusalem at the time of an annual festival, so enemy soldiers now pour into the city, but only to slaughter its citizens (21-22).