1 Samuel 15:2

I remember. Literally, “I have given attention to.” The Amalekites were a nomadic race that inhabited the desert region between Palestine and Egypt. Their livelihood seems to have been secured chiefly by predatory raids on neighboring tribes (see on Gen. 36:12). They had made an unprovoked attack on the children of Israel in the vicinity of Mt. Sinai (Ex. 17:8-16). After that battle Moses called the name of the place “Jehovah-nissi,” saying, “The Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.” In the prophecy of Balaam, Amalek is called “the first of the nations,” meaning that they were the first to war against Israel, but Balaam added that “in the end he shall come to destruction” (Num. 24:20, RSV).

Without doubt the Amalekites had more recently been raiding the southern part of Judah, in the vicinity of Beersheba, and this may have been one reason for the elders of that region asking for a king (see ch. 8:1-5). As Joshua was instructed to defend the Gibeonites against the unprovoked attack of the five kings of the southern confederacy, so Saul was commissioned to relieve Israel from the attacks of the Amalekites. In Joshua’s day the killing of the five kings brought peace. Had Saul carried out the plan of God, Israel would probably have had peace from that quarter much longer than they actually had. The reference to the Amalekites in ch. 14:48 may refer to this campaign, for vs. 49-52 are obviously parenthetical.