Thou shalt save alive nothing No human creature; for the beasts, some few excepted, were given for a prey. This slaughter of all the people is to be understood only in case they did not surrender when summoned, but rejected the conditions of peace when offered them. In which case their condition was worse than that of any other people, whose males only were to be slain, Deuteronomy 20:14.
Related Commentaries of Deuteronomy 20:16
Deuteronomy 20:16
16 But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: