James Dunn Part 3 - Gospel of Mark and the Jewish War

Dunn argues that the first 'readers and auditors' of the Gospel of Mark likely included people who had experienced the Jewish war (70 A.D.) or the events leading up to it: 

All this suggests in turn a close knowledge of the Jewish revolt and its antecedents shared by the writer and the recipients of the Gospel— that is, somewhere close to the land of Israel, probably Syria. Our knowledge of Christian communities in Israel-Syria during and immediately after the war is almost nonexistent. But it is certainly plausible to allow the possibility that someone who had endured some of the early hardships of the revolt wrote his Gospel for the benefit of Jesus-Messianists who were still in Judea and when his note to the reader in 13.14 would still have relevance. Or, alternatively in the wider region of Syria, when there would be many readers or auditors who had experienced the war and who resonated with its warnings and encouragement.

 James D.G. Dunn, Jesus, Paul and the Gospels (Wm. B. Eerdmanns Pub. Co.  2011).