“What happened to us, they call it collateral damage,” he says bitterly.

Mohamad’s wife Dina and their four-year-old son were among the civilian victims of an Israeli air strike on their house. The Israel Defense Forces said they’d targeted Hezbollah infrastructure. Source: SBS / Colin Cosier

On that fateful day, the entire family was home: Mohamad with his wife and two sons, his parents, his sister, and his brother’s family of five.

At 5pm, Israel sent a warning to evacuate. The decision to stay still haunts Mohamad. He says he and his wife weren’t connected to Hezbollah and believed their suburb was free of any militant fighters or infrastructure. They thought the warning was a mistake.

However, they did not answer further questions regarding why the house had been targeted and what information the IDF had about its civilian occupants.

Mohamad doesn’t know why his house was targeted by Israel. The decision to stay despite an evacuation order still haunts him. Source: SBS / Colin Cosier

That day became one of the deadliest for Lebanon in the war as Israel launched a series of airstrikes across southern and eastern Lebanon, saying it targeted Hezbollah infrastructure.

Across the border, at least 46,000 Israelis were forced to flee their homes and at least 47 civilians and 80 soldiers were killed.

Weakened militarily, Hezbollah is facing the future without its powerful leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah. Supporters still pay homage to him at the site of the targeted Israeli airstrike that killed him in September 2024 in the Beirut suburb of Dahieh. Source: SBS / Colin Cosier

Although Israel fired the missile that killed his family members, Mohamad also holds Hezbollah responsible for dragging Lebanon into the war by supporting Hamas in Gaza.

“My point of view, you should only protect your land and only what happens inside our country. We don’t have anything related to support any kind of military action outside Lebanon,” he says.

‘Hezbollah isn’t our destiny’

“Resistance is an act of protecting, not of attacking. Unfortunately, after the October 7 operation in Gaza, Hezbollah decided unilaterally, without consulting any of the Lebanese, to open a front called the support front. Since you attacked, you gave Israel the pretext to bomb civilians.”

Shop owner Mahmoud Chouaib filed a lawsuit against Hezbollah leadership after the group’s supporters allegedly looted his warehouse. Source: SBS / Colin Cosier

Mahmoud has joined a group that wants to form a political alternative to Hezbollah for Lebanon’s Shia Muslims, who make up around a third of the country’s population.

“Our project is to help the Shia come back to the state and stop being an armed set who takes orders from Iran,” he says.

Lebanese journalist Mohamad Barakat started a group that wants to become a political alternative to Hezbollah for Lebanon’s Shia population. Source: SBS / Colin Cosier

It aims to run in next year’s elections for Lebanon’s 128-seat parliament divided between Christians, Muslims, and Druze.

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