In the afternoon of Monday, September 23, 2024, between six and ten civilians were killed in an alleged Israeli airstrike that hit a petrol station in the town of Yahmor located in West Beqaa in Lebanon. Among the identified victims of the strike were Youssef Musa Abu Ahmed, Hussein Mohammed Ali, Mohammed Abbas, Khalil Nazik Farhat, Abbas Raslo al-Abd, and Hajj Ali.

According to initial sources, “violent raids” in the middle of the town led to two people being killed after a petrol station was hit in the attack. As the day progressed more people were reported as having been killed. Ali Youssef shared the names of the six men who were killed in the airstrike on Facebook; in the post, he prayed for those who lost their lives and stated that they were “with their Lord,” and that this was “their reward and their light.”

Following news of the incident, friends and family took to social media to mourn the loss of their loved ones. One such post by Facebook user Hadaia Usf noted how they initially did not pay attention to the reports and news being shared; it was only later that they recognised the name of one of his former students, Khalil Nazik Farhat as being a victim of the airstrike. Hadaia Usf wrote: “I stopped for a moment to calm the tape of my memories that took me back to a relatively distant time, a picture appeared to me there, I started wiping the dust off it to find you, Khalil!! You are still that naughty student on the school benches, with your curly blond hair, and your angelic face dominated by the whiteness of snow. You used to sum up the noise of life as a whole… with you, so you used to complain about sitting for long periods in the school classes that used to imprison your spirit that was eager to fly in God’s vast space!! Here you are, Khalil, you have arrived… We lost you physically, yes!! But you have reached where your spirit was pulling you to rise and ascend, without limits or controls!”

An image of Khalil, a young smiling man with a thick beard dressed in a white dotted T-shirt was attached to the post.

Other posts by friends and family shared images of the deceased, and one of the men pictured is seen wearing a green hat representing the Amal Movement. All of them were adults, and at least one man was elderly.

Amal is a political party that used to operate a militia and is now allied with Hezbollah. As there is no indication of militant activities, all individuals are coded as civilians.

Haji Abbas’s death was mourned in the post by Ali Youssef who shared a picture of the victim. He was a middle-aged man with grey hair and a grey beard wearing a striped T-shirt and a blue jacket.

Twitter/X user @Mulhak shared an image of a destroyed white building with a red roof. The caption read “Raid on the town of Yahmar in West Bekaa.”

Where sources identified a belligerent, all sources attributed the strike to the Israeli military.