[Sidenote: I Macc. 13:33, 43-48]
Then Simon built the strongholds of Judea and fenced them about with high
towers and great walls and gates and bars, and laid up stores in the
strongholds. In those days he laid siege to Gazara, and surrounded it with
armies, and made an engine of siege and brought it up to the city, and
smote a tower and captured it. And those who were in the engine leaped
forth into the city, and there was a great tumult in the city. And the
people of the city tore their garments, and went up on the walls with
their wives and children, and cried with a loud voice, requesting Simon to
make peace with them. And they said, Do not deal with us according to our
wickednesses but according to your mercy. So Simon was reconciled to them
and did not fight against them. But he expelled them from the city and
cleansed the houses in which the idols were, and so entered into it with
singing and praise. And when he had put all uncleanness out of it, he
placed in it such men as would keep the law and made it stronger than it
was before, and built a dwelling place for himself in it.

[Sidenote: I Macc. 13:49-53]
But those who were in the citadel at Jerusalem were prevented from going
out and from going into the country, and from buying and selling, so that
they suffered exceedingly from hunger, and a great number of them perished
through famine. Then they cried out to Simon to make peace with them. He
did so, but put them out from there, and cleansed the citadel from its
pollutions. And he entered it on the twenty-third day of the second month
in the one hundred and seventy-first year, with praise and palm branches,
with harps, with cymbals, with viols, with hymns, and with songs, because
a great enemy was destroyed out of Israel. And he ordained that they
should observe that day each year with gladness. And the temple mount,
which was beside the citadel, he made stronger than before, and there he
dwelt with his men. And Simon saw that John his son had grown to manhood,