A woman found footage of an Israeli soldier playing the piano in a bombed-out house in southern Lebanon

A video circulating on social media captured a disturbing coincidence for a young Lebanese woman who came across footage on Instagram of IDF soldiers playing her old piano and walking among the bombed-out wreckage of her family home.

When Julia Ali, who lives in London, UK, came across this video a few days ago, she recognized the unique interior of her family home in the southern Lebanese city of Hiam and the piano she had fond memories of playing.

The piano room, with its nearly floor-to-ceiling arched window that had once filled the space with light, had windows and doors broken out, and now looked dull and gray, and much of its interior was reduced to ruins.

Shocked and heartbroken, Ali unearthed a year-old video of her playing the song in the same room at the same piano. Pianist and posted it alongside footage of the soldiers in a somber before-and-after post on her Instagram account. The post has been viewed more than a million times.

“Watching the place I called home turn into ruins is a pain too deep to express,” Ali wrote in the post.

“It wasn’t just walls and a roof; it was years of dreams, sacrifices and love of my family built in a sanctuary. Now to see the invaders wandering around it, mocking it, touching the piano into which I once poured my heart mind you…it feels like they are trampling on pieces of my soul.”

The video was published by a Palestinian journalist

The video, which shows soldiers inside the house, was posted on the Instagram and X accounts of a Palestinian journalist known as Tamer. Tamer lives outside Gaza and asked the CBC to use only his first name or X, Tamerqd, out of concern that it could jeopardize the safety of his family, who are still in Gaza.

He told CBC News that he found the video last Friday, posted as an Instagram story on an IDF soldier’s account. Tamer shared the original post with CBC, but the account is no longer active.

The video shows one of the soldiers lying on a piano, swinging his legs and aiming a gun at a broken window, while another leans over the piano, also pointing a gun, while a third plays the piano. Two other soldiers pass through the house, one of them jumping to the music.

Lebanon’s state news agency reported on Tuesday that an estimated 40,000 residential units in the country’s border region were destroyed by Israeli airstrikes.

Hiam, which is about six kilometers from the border with Israel and is home to one of the largest Shia communities in southern Lebanon, has been under airstrikes for weeks. Hezbollah said last Thursday that it had launched several rocket and artillery fire against Israeli forces near Hiam.

The Israeli military and the Hezbollah militant group have exchanged fire across the border for more than a year since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, but fighting has escalated over the past six weeks.

More than 3,000 people have died in the past year, the vast majority of them in the past six weeks, and more than 1.2 million people have been displaced by the fighting, according to Lebanese health authorities.

Smoke rises over the Lebanese city of Hiam after Israeli strikes, amid ongoing fighting between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in a photo from Marjayoun, near the border with Israel, on October 20. (Karamallah Daher/Reuters)

“I have hope that we will rise from this”

It is not known when Ali and her family were last at the home. CBC News reached out to Ali but did not hear back in time for publication.

In an Instagram post, she expressed her hope that she and others who have been driven from the land by the recent violence will eventually be able to return and rebuild their lives.

“I have hope that we will rise from this, rebuilding not just a home, but a new chapter filled with resilience, strength and memories of all that was lost,” she wrote.

In a statement to CBC News on Tuesday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) did not confirm that the video was posted by one of its soldiers, but said it “acts to address exceptional incidents that deviate from the orders and expected values ​​of IDF soldiers.”

Israeli soldiers during a ground operation in southern Lebanon, near the border with Israel in October. The IDF said it was investigating social media posts that allegedly showed disrespectful behavior by its soldiers. (Sam McNeill/The Associated Press)

The IDF said it was looking into reports of the video posted on social media and was “taking command and disciplinary action against them.”

“In some verified cases, it was concluded that the expression or behavior of the military in the video was inappropriate, and this was dealt with accordingly,” the statement said.

Social media posts by Israeli soldiers stationed in Gaza and Lebanon have been the subject of intense media scrutiny in the past, including New York Times, Al Jazeera and Times of Israelwho reported images and videos showing the cavalier looting of homes and buildings, the abuse of local populations and other inappropriate behavior during military operations.

The IDF has condemned such behavior, telling the New York Times, for example, that such publications violate the IDF. normative acts which prohibit the sharing of content that “affects the image of the IDF and its perception in the eyes of the public,” as well as shows behavior that “harms human dignity.”

Screenshot from two videos published on social networks. The squares mark some overlapping areas and indicate that the video was taken in the same location. (juliaali1/Instagram, tamer.qdh/Instagram, CBC)

CBC News analyzed the videos shared by Ali and Tamer and found similarities that suggest they were filmed in the same location, including:

• A large chandelier hanging from the ceiling.

• Unique arched window frame and floor to ceiling curtains.

• Position and size of the smaller window to the right of the larger one.

• Molding on one of the supporting columns in the room.

• A small sofa to the right of the piano that has been moved but appears to be the same shape and size.

• The shape, size and position of the piano, although its orientation has changed slightly.

• Design and size of the piano bench.