At dawn on September 27, 2024, an alleged Israeli airstrike hit a three-storey family home in the Al-Sindyana neighbourhood in Shebaa in the Nabatieh governorate of Lebanon, destroying it completely and killing at least nine civilians all of whom belonged to the Zahra family.

According to sources, Israeli fighter jets allegedly launched the attack between 03:00 and 04:00 on the area less than a kilometre from Naqqar pond and the border. Ambulance teams were called to the site where they worked to clear the rubble and recover the bodies of nine members of the Zahra family, a shepherding family in the area, including at least three women, one of them pregnant, and two children.

The information about nine casualties from one family in Shebaa was voiced by Al-Sharq correspondent from Beirut, Maha Hoteit, in a video report shared by Al-Aharq Now on Facebook. The Telegram account of Lebanon News provided the names of the nine victims.

Among those who were killed in the attack were Hussein Khalil Zahra and his wife, Ratiba Asaad Hamdan. Their son, Khader Hussein Zahra, was killed along with his wife, Aisha Hamadeh, and their young son, Ali Khader Zahra, who was four years old.

Hassan Hussein Zahra, the son of Hussein and Ratiba, was also killed along with his sisters, Duaa Hussein Zahra and Khadra Hussein Zahra who was pregnant with her first child at the time of her death.

Finally, 11-year-old Youssef Nasri Hamdan was killed in the incident. According to an interview with Suweyda 24, Youssef was a young boy, not older than 14 years, living with his uncle. The Facebook post by Hoda Zbib indicated that Youssef was 11 years old. His father was based in another area of Lebanon when the incident happened, while his mother, Nidaa, was based in the city of Shahba in Syria. The post was accompanied by an image of the late Youssef dressed in a brown hoodie.

Hoda Zbib also wrote about the proximity of the strike site to the Golan Heights, and thus lands “occupied” by Israel, writing that the Zahra family was killed: “Less than a thousand meters away from the barbed wire and the Naqqar pond that separate the people of #Shebaa from their lands in the occupied farms of the town (Shebaa Farms).”

Multiple social media sources shared a photo collage featuring the civilians killed in the strike. Among them was a married couple, hugging their two small children, an elderly woman, two men, one of them standing along with a boy, and a teenage girl.

Following the incident, friends, family and social media users mourned the loss of the family. Naming the family members killed in the attack and sharing images of them, some shared religious messages stating “We belong to Allah and to Him we shall return,” whilst others shared their outrage that such an attack, “devoid of international law”, should take place.

Multiple sources, including Tripoli wataniye on Facebook, shared an image of the rescue efforts where at least five paramedics, wearing red uniforms and white helmets, attempted to remove rubble and retrieve the bodies, assisted by residents. JbeilDistrict was one of the accounts which shared the photo. The post included the text “Ambulance teams continue to work to remove rubble from the targeted building in Shebaa, Lebanon, searching for missing persons, after 9 bodies were recovered this morning.”

Twitter/X user @Alexghdr shared a video showing the family’s house destroyed to rubble, and the torn pages of the Holy Quran lying on the ground.

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