In 681 BCE, Sennacherib was assassinated.
In 701 BC, Sennacherib first moved to attack the Syro-Hittite and Phoenician cities in the north
 Sennacherib's ultimate treatment of Babylon, destroying the city and its temples, was sacrilege and the king appears to have neglected the temples in Assyria until he carried out a renovation of the temple of Ashur in Assur late in his reign

