Geolocation
Airwars assessment
An alleged Israeli airstrike hit a three-story residential building in Shamstar, a town in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley on the morning/afternoon of November 23, 2024, killing at least 12 civilians and injuring at least eight others. At least one militant was also likely killed in the strike, alongside four other individuals whose civilian status was ambiguous based on open source reporting. Three people continue to be missing in the wake of the strike.
The names of those killed in the strike are: Zeina Hassan Mazloum, her daughters Zainab Hisham Haider Ahmed and Ruqaya Hisham Haider Ahmed, her sons Mahdi Hisham Haider Ahmed and Ali Hisham Haider Ahmed, Samar Ali Haider Hamed, Alaa Ali Zuaiter, her son two and a half-year-old Ali Al-Akbar Hussein Haider Ahmed, Fatima Al-Faytrouni, Ali Redha Ahmed Haider Ahmed, and a female identified only by her first name, Doba, who is said to have been an Ethiopian national. Of the 12 people confirmed to have been killed in the strike, at least two were women and at least five were children.
Another individual, Abdullah Haider Ahmed, was also reportedly killed. With only one source, Facebook user Ghassan Berjasse, naming him among those killed on November 23rd, it is possible that Ghassan may have been referring to Hashem Abdullah Haider Ahmed who, for reasons described below, is recorded as a militant. For now, Abdullah has been included among the list of 12 civilians killed. This will be updated should additional information come to light that indicates this individual is indeed the militant outlined below with a closely matching name.
At least eight people were injured in the strike: Abdullah Ahmed Haider Ahmed, his son Ali Abdullah Haider Ahmed, Samira Ali Al-Araibi, Areej Ahmed Haider Ahmed, her sister Aya Ahmed Haider Ahmed, Muhammad Hussein Shehitli, his sister Rita Hussein Shehitli, and Aya Muhammad Shehitli.
At the time of Airwars’ research of this incident, three people were still missing: Mohammad Abdullah Haider Ahmed, son of Abdullah, Rabia Abdullah Haider Ahmed, daughter of Abdullah, and Abeer Mohammad Haider Ahmed. They have not been listed among the deceased or injured but this will be updated should more information come to light.
Photos of the strike’s aftermath show smoke blowing up into the sky, captured from both the street-level, near to the Al Masri gas station and from inside a building in the area.
It was initially reported by Lebanon’s National News Agency and Sky News Arabia that a mother and her four children were killed in their home as a result of the strike. Social media posts confirmed that the mother and children were from the Haider Ahmed family, and that the father, Hisham Abdullah Haider Ahmed, was likely also killed in the strike.
Photos posted to social media show the mother, Zeina Hassan Mazloum, smiling with someone’s arm around her. Photos were also shared of their children. The youngest was an infant girl who is shown wearing a light pink cardigan and is posing on steps and next to a plant. The older girl is pictured also with someone’s arm around her, wearing a white headscarf and a jean jacket. The two boys are also pictured, with the youngest appearing to wear a sports jersey while playing a game on a device.
Later in the day, the Lebanese Ministry of Health raised the number of casualties to eight people dead, among them the four children, and nine people injured, with four being in critical condition. There were also reports of work being done to remove rubble in the aftermath of the strike to find those who were missing. Al Mayadeen News went on to report that seven people were recovered from under the rubble that afternoon, all of whom had been killed in the strike.
The number of the dead continued to rise, with subsequent reports citing that up to 22 people were killed and ‘dozens’ injured. Lists posted to social media identified the names of eleven people killed, eight wounded, and five missing. Two of those listed as missing were later confirmed to be dead by other local sources.
Mona Al-Hajj Hassan called the incident a “massacre” of the Al-Haider Ahmed family and a “shocking and astonishing day” in Shamstar. She wrote that people in the town had been in the proess of collecting organs, washing them, performing tayammum [purification ritual], praying, and burying all day. “This scene was repeated more than five times from nine in the morning until four in the afternoon,” she wrote. “We became like machines washing, counting, and shedding tears.” Al-Ajj Hassan’s post was accompanied by a photo of what appears to be a row of over sixteen burial plots that have been prepared.
The death of two teenage boys, potentially young men, one of whom was, Ali Redha Ahmed Haider Ahmed, was confirmed by the Al-Farah Sports Club, a club with karate classes for adults and children. The management of the club announced the death of its players on Facebook and also offered prayers for the recovery of another player, Abdullah Haidar Ahmed, who was wounded in the strike. The club also posted a photo of a young man, wearing a white button-up shirt and sitting by some trees overlaid with a broken heart emoji – presumably one of the players killed in the strike.
The post shared by Al-Farah Sports Club also remembered Muhammad Ali Haidar Ahmed. Early sources reporting on the strike, like Lebanon’s National News Agency and Sky News Arabia, referenced above, wrote that “a mother and her four children were killed in their home as a result of the strike.” Looking at images shared of a mother and her four children, it appears that Muhammad was potentially among those children. Muhammad looks quite young in the photos shared in his memory, and it is unclear whether he was a child at the time of his death. Posting to Facebook on November 24th, Alaa Dirani shared a Hezbollah martyr photo in which Muhammad’s face is transposed onto the photo, and the title “the martyred mujahid” is invoked, below. While it is unclear whether Muhammad was a child at the time of his death, his civilian status has been recorded as contested. This will be updated should additional information come to light.
Alaa Zuaiter, a teacher at Kfardan Public School, was killed in the strike with her two-and-a-half year old son, Ali Al-Akbar Hussein Haider Ahmed. According to her personal Facebook page, she studied at the Lebanese University’s Faculty of Sociology and at the Al Mortada School. Her occupation was listed as ‘educational counselor’ at the Kfardan Official Intermediate School. Zuaiter’s profile picture is a photo of her young son being held by a man who could be his father. The ‘Evening professors committee’ Facebook page called Zuaiter an “educational mentor” and posted a photo of her wearing a bejeweled white outfit and veil alongside a photo of her son. One of Zuaiter’s friends also remembered her in a Facebook post, accompanied by photos of Zuaiter and her son, celebrating what appears to have been his first birthday.
A photo posted to social media shows Zuaiter’s husband, Hussein Haider Ahmed, reportedly carrying the remains of his wife and son in a shroud while the coffins of his brothers and family follow from behind him. One man in the procession is carrying a large poster with a child’s face on it, though it is unclear who this is; the poster is accompanied with the Hezbollah logo on the bottom right-hand corner. Though it’s not clear from the photo of the procession who is on the martyr poster, it appears to match an image shared to Facebook by Alaa Dirani of Muhammad Ali Ahmed Haider whose civilian status has been recorded as contested, for reasons mentioned above.
On November 23rd, @abalfadell posted three Hezbollah martyr photos to Twitter/X. The busts of Haider Ali Mohammed Adthan, Ali Shoqi al-Hajj Hassan, and Hamza Yassin Hassan Qassim are each featured on a respective photo. Transcribed on the photo, above their name, is the line “الشهيد المهندس” or “the martyred engineer”. As this title is not explicitly militant in nature, Haider, Ali, and Hamza’s civilian status has been recorded as contested. This will be updated should additional information come to light.
An image shared by Facebook user Alaa Dirani on November 24th shows the bust of Hashem Abdullah Haider Ahmed, Zeina’s husband, attached to a Hezbollah martyr poster. While Hezbollah has released martyr photos of people whose connection to the organisation did not appear to be militant in nature, the text below Hashem’s face reads “الشهيد المجاهد” or “the martyred mujahid”. Due to the invocation of the term “Mujahid” and the context of his memorialisation, Hashem has been recorded as a militant. This individual has been recorded separately from alleged civilian Abdullah Haider Ahmed (mentioned above), but this will be updated should additional information come to light.
Reports described the nature of the incident as an airstrike, referencing Israeli ‘warplanes’ and ‘aircraft.’ Therefore, this incident has been graded as a ‘likely strike’, with a civilian harm rating of ‘fair’.
The local time of the incident is unknown.
The victims were named as:
Family members (6)
Family members (2)
Family members (2)
Family members (2)
Family members (2)
The victims were named as:
Geolocation notes (2) [ collapse]
Reports of the incident mention a residential building being struck in the town of Chmistar (شمسطار) in the Baalbek-Hermel Governorate (بعلبك – الهرمل). Analysing audio-visual material from sources, we have narrowed the location down to the following exact coordinates: 33.960906, 36.016482.
Summary
Sources (69) [ collapse]
Media
from sources (35) [ collapse]
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Source: Hz melhem tlais -
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Source: Sporting Farah Club -
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Source: Ali haidar daqmaq -
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Source: Fidaa zaiter -
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Source: @F24online -
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Source: @Ertikaznews -
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Source: @Ahmadhamieh313 -
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Source: Our martyrs -
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Source: Ragheb sulaiman hamya -
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Source: Yajnoub2 -
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Source: Alaa dirani -
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Source: Alaa dirani -
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Source: Alaa dirani -
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Source: Chemstar wikileaks -
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Source: Chemstar wikileaks -
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Source: Chemstar wikileaks -
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Source: Chemstar wikileaks -
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Source: bintjbeil.org -
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Source: Evening teachers -
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Source: Southern lebanon -
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Source: Mona Al-Hajj Hassan -
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Source: Walaa hajj hassan tfaily -
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Source: Ali haidar daqmaq -
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Source: Ayman bou fakhreddine -
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Source: Ayman bou fakhreddine -
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