Ezekiel 20:23
I lifted up mine hand unto them also in the wilderness, that I would scatter them among the heathen, and disperse them through the countries; I lifted up mine hand unto them also in the wilderness, that I would scatter them among the heathen, and disperse them through the countries;
To lift up the hand is to swear an oath, and in this verse God swears against Israel. The oath is spoken in the wilderness to the second generation, the children who grew up during the wandering. It declares that after their settlement in the promised land they would be scattered among the heathen and dispersed through the countries.
Unlike their fathers, whom God shut out of Canaan, this generation was not barred from entering the land despite the oath of future scattering. They were permitted to go in and possess it, while the judgment pronounced looked forward to a later dispersion. God pronounced that scattering because during the forty years of wandering they failed to learn the lesson set before them. Throughout that time they continued in great neglect of His Sabbaths and greatly polluted them.