16. Our enemies. Sanballat and the Samaritans, Tobiah and the Ammonites, Geshem and the Arabians, and the Ashdodites (see 4:7) are the special “enemies” here meant. The “heathen that were about” the Jews were other nations living in Palestine, Transjordan and Syria. Even some of these were unfriendly and disliked any advancement of Jewish power and prosperity. The hatred against the Jews that existed in certain circles during the time of Xerxes, as indicated by the events described in the book of Esther, was still alive, and, as history reveals, has never died.