2 Kings 24:20 (ESV)

20 For because of the anger of the LORD it came to the point in Jerusalem and Judah that he cast them out from his presence. And Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.

2 Kings 24:20a uses human words to sketch the godly reaction to these wrong human actions. 2 Kings 24:20b brings up the crucial mistake that caused the definitive end of Judah: Zedekiah’s rebellion against Nebuchadnezzar. We can make a causal connection between 2 Kings 24:20a and 2 Kings 24:20b in the following manner: because the Lord rejected Judah, he gave King Zedekiah the power to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar (see also 2 Chronicles 36:17 where it says directly that the Lord sends Nebuchadnezzar to Jerusalem).

The Lord can punish by letting people do wrong things, with disastrous results. Compare this to Romans 1:24: Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves. The rebellion was a catastrophic sin, because Zedekiah had sworn to not do this and when he swore this oath, he had called God to be his witness (see 2 Chronicles 36:13 and Ezekiel 37:23).