Lebanese Internal Security Forces officers in front of the courthouse in Beirut. (Credit: Hassan Ammar/AFP File Photo)
BEIRUT — A mother was arrested after a video of her beating her 2-year-old toddler was circulating on social media, prompting widespread condemnations by users, a security source confirmed to L'Orient Today. Her child has been hospitalized.
The source, contacted on Friday, said the suspect, a woman in her twenties, does not hold identification documents and assaulted her toddler in a house in Qabr Shmoun (Aley district) "around a week ago."
The Internal Security Forces (ISF) opened an investigation even before the video was shared online, and then proceeded to arrest the woman.
Prior to the incident, the woman and her child took a public bus without a specific destination, the source explained, and the driver took them to his house. The woman then assaulted her toddler in the driver's home after he had left for work.
In the two-minute-long footage posted on X on Wednesday, the woman is seen intermittently beating her child while an unidentified person films the scene, seemingly without the suspect's knowledge.
The toddler was examined by a forensic doctor and underwent treatment for two days in the Karantina Hospital in Beirut, the source added, without specifying the type of injuries sustained by the victim. The hospital was not immediately available to comment on the incident.
The child was then taken in by the Bonheur du Ciel association. According to its website, Bonheur du Ciel, headed by Father Majdi Allawi, "provides care and protection for underage girls from life’s dangers, educates and supports children scientifically, culturally and psychologically, treats addicts ... and provides care for elderly men who have no family."
'Cruel and heartless'
The security source claimed the suspect suffers from mental health issues and has violent tendencies towards her child. It added that her husband left her, assuming it could be a contributing factor to her feelings of anger and frustration, according to preliminary findings in the investigation.
In the evening, the ISF issued a statement, confirming that the mother is “mentally unstable” and that she abused her 2-year-old child, in Baawerta (Aley) on Sept. 13. She allegedly did it “because she hates the father who abandoned them.”
A medical examination of the child revealed bruises on several parts of their body and scabies.
The video sparked online outrage. "Cruel and heartless… her punishment must be severe… she has broken my heart," writes one user on X, formerly Twitter. "One can’t even continue watching the video," says another.
A report published on April 13, 2025, by the Union for the Protection of Juveniles in Lebanon (UPEL) revealed alarming figures: in 2024, at least 930 cases of violence against minors were recorded.
