Gaza and Tyre
6 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Gaza, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment, because they carried away captive the whole community, to deliver them up to Edom; 7 but I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, and it will devour its palaces. 8 I will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and him who holds the scepter from Ashkelon; and I will turn my hand against Ekron; and the remnant of the Philistines will perish,” says the Lord Yahweh. 9 Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Tyre, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they delivered up the whole community to Edom, and didn’t remember the brotherly covenant; 10 but I will send a fire on the wall of Tyre, and it will devour its palaces.”
Two oracles share a single crime — trafficking whole populations — and the second adds the breaking of a treaty.
The charge against Gaza is slave trading at wholesale: they carried away an entire community to hand over to Edom. The Hebrew describes a complete deportation rather than a raiding party's haul, and the crime is that the captives were merchandise rather than enemies.
The sentence walks the coast city by city — Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ekron — ending with the remnant of the Philistines perishing. Four of the five cities are named; Gath is missing, and the book names it later as already fallen Amos 6:2.
Tyre draws the same charge plus one clause: they did not remember the brotherly covenant. Tyre and Israel had a treaty going back to the timber and craftsmen supplied for Solomon's building. The added offense is doing this to a treaty partner.
That clause is the cycle's hinge in miniature. Six nations are charged with acts any hearer would condemn, and one of them with breaking faith with a brother — which is what Judah and Israel are charged with when the formula reaches them. The vocabulary of covenant enters through a pagan city, four oracles before it lands at home.
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