The Israelites also mobilized, gathered supplies, and marched out to meet them. The Israelites camped before them like two small flocks of goats, while the Arameans covered the countryside.
We have here an account of another successful campaign which Ahab, by divine aid, made against the Syrians, in which he gave them a greater defeat than in the former. Strange! Ahab idolatrous and yet victorious, a persecutor and yet a conqueror! God has wise and holy ends in suffering wicked men to prosper, and glorifies his own name thereby. I.
Commenting on 1 Kings 20:22-30
And the children of Israel were numbered, and were all present,.... The same as before; the two hundred and thirty two young men of the princes of the provinces, and 7000 of the people, not one was missing: and went against them; out of Samaria, towards Aphek: and the children of Israel pitched before them like two little flocks of kids: being few and weak...
like two little flocks of kids--Goats are never seen in large flocks, or scattered, like sheep; and hence the two small but compact divisions of the Israelite force are compared to goats, not sheep. Humanly speaking, that little handful of men would have been overpowered by numbers.