Commentary for Numbers 13:28

בצרות is an expression for strength. Its rendering in the Targum is כריכן, a term for circular fortresses, for in the Aramaic language כריך means round.

אפס כי עז העם, it is impossible to conquer the land since we cannot defeat its people. Not only are the people tough, but the cities are fortified. The inhabitants of the land, the Amelakites hate us fiercely. They will engage in a preemptive war against us so that we should not even get near their borders.

אפס כי עז העם, "However the people are tough, etc." Seeing that Moses had specifically asked them to determine if the people who inhabited that land were strong or weak, they now had to report that the people were indeed formidable. Not only that but they dwelled in heavily fortified towns. They concluded that part of their report by mentioning that they had observed giants in the land. They stated this so that the Israelites should not think that the fact that the towns were fortified revealed weakness and lack of self confidence by the inhabitants.

אפס כי עז העם...והערים וגו', “But…the people are powerful,… and the cities greatly fortified.” Even though by saying this they contradicted what they had said previously, as Rashi had pointed out, by reporting that the people lived in fortified cities they had indicated that they were afraid of invaders, only if they lived in open, unwalled cities, did this signify their confidence in their ability to repel attackers. Perhaps the spies did not even realize that their factual report contradicted the conclusions they had drawn.

V. 28. אפס, eigentlich: dies alles ist aber nichts, verliert allen Wert, denn das Volk ist zu stark. בצרות גדלת מאוד, nicht הצרות גדלת, in ungemeiner Großartigkeit fest, von Riesen gegen Riesen befestigt; darum für gewöhnliche Menschen völlig uneinnehmbar. וגם ילידי הענק – siehe zu V. 22.

אפס כי עז העם היושב בארץ והערים בצורות גדולותת however “the people are very fierce, and the cities are fortified and great;” they described two major drawbacks to the assumptions that these people were easy to dislodge. In addition to this, they spoke of the giants they had seen, וגם ילידי ענק ראינו שם, “and we have also seen the children of Anak (a giant) there.” We have read in Deuteronomy 9,2, that Moses reminded the new generation of Israelites that they had heard about the awesome reputation of these giants already from their parents who had described them as invincible

והערים בצורות גדולות מאד וגם בני ענקים ראינו שם, “and the cities are greatly fortified, and we even saw descendants of the dreaded giants there.” They added further:

The words העם היושב עליה also mean that the people do not only dwell in towns but are scattered all over the land, i.e. they are not afraid of being attacked. You will find that Bamidbar Rabbah on verse 29 interprets the fact that the Amalekites dwelled in the South of the land as proof that they did not live in townships. The words היושב בה are a hint that only people of extraordinary physique are able to live on that land successfully.