“When the king of Ai saw it, they hurried and rose up early, and the men of the city went out against Israel to battle, he and all his people, at the time appointed, before the Arabah; but he didn’t know that there was an ambush against him behind the city.”
Joshua 8:14 (WEB)
Context Reading
12He took about five thousand men, and set them in ambush between Bethel and Ai, on the west side of the city. 13So they set the people, even all the army who was on the north of the city, and their ambush on the west of the city; and Joshua went that night into the middle of the valley. 14When the king of Ai saw it, they hurried and rose up early, and the men of the city went out against Israel to battle, he and all his people, at the time appointed, before the Arabah; but he didn’t know that there was an ambush against him behind the city. 15Joshua and all Israel made as if they were beaten before them, and fled by the way of the wilderness. 16All the people who were in the city were called together to pursue after them. They pursued Joshua, and were drawn away from the city.