Tiglath-Pileser III, 744-727 BC
When Tiglath-Pileser III ascended the throne Assyria was in the throes of a revolution. Civil war and pestilence were devastating the country, and many of its most northerly colonies in Asia Minor had been wrested from it by Urartu. In 746 BC the city of Kalhu joined the rebels, and on the 13th of Iyyar in the following year, an Assyrian general (Turtanu) named Pulu, took the name of Tiglath-pileser III, seized the crown, and made sweeping changes to the Assyrian government, considerably improving its efficiency and security.
The conquered provinces were organized under an elaborate bureaucracy, with the king at the head — each district paying a fixed tribute and providing a military contingent. The Assyrian forces at this time became a professional standing army, that by successive improvements became an irresistible fighting machine; and Assyrian policy was henceforth directed toward reducing the whole civilized world into a single empire, throwing its trade and wealth into Assyrian hands. These changes are often identified as the beginning of the "Second Assyrian Empire".
When Tiglath-Pileser III had ascended the throne of Assyria, he invaded Babylonia, defeated its king Nabonassar, and abducted the gods of Šapazza; the Assyrian-Babylonian Chronicle informs us (ABC 1 Col.1:5). After subjecting Babylon to tribute, defeating Urartu and conquering the Medes, Persians and Neo-Hittites, Tiglath-Pileser III directed his armies into Aramea, of which large swathes had regained independence, and the commercially successful Mediterranean seaports of Phoenicia. He took Arpad near Aleppo in 740 BC after a siege of three years, and razed Hamath. Azariah, king of Judah had been an ally of the king of Hamath, and thus was compelled by Tiglath-Pileser to do him homage and pay yearly tribute.
In 738 BC, in the reign of Menahem, king of Israel, Tiglath-Pileser III occupied Philistia (Palestine) and invaded Israel, imposing on it a heavy tribute (2 Kings 15:19). Ahaz, king of Judah, engaged in a war against Israel and Aramea, appealed for help to the Assyrian king by means of presents of gold and silver (2 Kings 16:8); Tiglath-Pileser III accordingly "marched against Damascus, defeated and put king Rezin to death, and besieged the city itself". Leaving part of his army to continue the siege, he advanced, ravaging with fire and sword the provinces east of the Jordan (Nabatea, Moab and Edom), Philistia, and Samaria; and in 732 BC he took the chief Aramean state of Damascus, deporting many of its inhabitants and the Jewish inhabitants of Samaria to Assyria. He also forced tribute from the Arabs of the deserts in the Arabian peninsula.
In 729 BC, Tiglath-Pileser III went to Babylonia and captured Nabu-mukin-zeri, the king of Babylon (ABC 1 Col.1:21). He had himself crowned as King Pulu of Babylon. Tiglath-Pileser III died in 727 BC, and was succeeded by Shalmaneser V. However, King Hoshea of Israel suspended paying tribute, and allied himself with Egypt against Assyria in 725 BC. This led Shalmaneser to invade Syria (2 Kings 17:5) and besiege Samaria (capital city of Israel) for three years (ABC 1 Col.1:27).
Read more about this topic: Neo-Assyrian Empire