Ali Cherri Files Complaint Against Israel Over Beirut Bombing

(MENAFN- USA Art News) Ali Cherri Files Complaint in France Seeking Probe of Beirut Strike That Killed His Parents

Lebanese artist Ali Cherri has filed a civil complaint in France calling for an investigation into a November 2024 Israeli strike on a residential building in Beirut's Noueiri neighborhood that killed seven civilians, including his parents, Mahmoud and Nadira Cherri. Submitted on April 2 with the French War Crimes Unit alongside the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), the complaint targets“unknown perpetrators” while alleging the Israeli army's responsibility and arguing the attack may amount to a war crime under French criminal law and international humanitarian law.

The complaint draws on a digital reconstruction by Forensic Architecture (FA), supported by documentation from Amnesty International. According to the filing, the analysis points to the“targeted nature of the attack,” and FA reported identifying remnants consistent with GBU-39 munitions.

The strike hit four floors of the building, including the apartment where Cherri's parents lived. The seventh, eighth, and ninth floors were destroyed, with the ninth floor's façade shown as blown out in FA's reconstruction. The complaint also names the death of the family's domestic aide, Birki Negesa, among those killed.

Because the building was a civilian object, the filing argues, the strike could fall within the scope of war crimes provisions recognized in French law and international humanitarian law. The case arrives amid growing efforts by human rights organizations to use European jurisdictions to pursue accountability for alleged violations committed abroad.

Cherri, a Lebanese artist (b. 1976) whose practice spans sculpture and moving image, has spent two decades examining how political violence imprints itself on bodies, landscapes, and material culture. His work has been presented at institutions including the Vienna Secession and the Swiss Institute. In 2022, he received the Silver Lion Award at the 59th Venice Biennale for the sculpture series“Titans” (2022) and the video installation“Of Men and Gods and Mud” (2022).

In a statement shared by FIDH, Cherri framed the complaint as both personal and civic.“As a son, a citizen, and a victim, it is my duty to ensure that this war crime committed by the Israeli army is recognised for what it is, so that it may be brought to justice - for my parents and for all the civilians killed that day,” he said.“Justice cannot undo death, but seeking justice means refusing to let impunity lead to the destruction of other lives.”

The Noueiri bombing was one episode within Israel's ongoing military campaign in Lebanon, an escalation that began in October 2023 and has intensified amid broader US–Israel–Iran tensions. Israel has said its strikes on Lebanese residential areas are aimed at neutralizing Hezbollah, the Iran-aligned militant group that fired rockets into Israel in March.

Humanitarian toll estimates vary by source. FIDH has reported more than 4,300 Lebanese deaths since 2023. The conflict-monitoring group ACLED has estimated that Israeli strikes have killed at least 1,000 people and displaced another million across the country.

Wadih Al-Asmar, co-founder and president of the Lebanese Center for Human Rights, described the filing as a precedent-setting step. In a statement, he said the complaint is“the first initiative to bring before judicial authorities the crimes committed by the Israeli army on Lebanese territory, of which civilians were the primary victims.”

For the art world, the case underscores how quickly an artist's public language of memory, loss, and material evidence can become a legal one. Whether French authorities open a full investigation remains to be seen, but the complaint places forensic analysis, human rights documentation, and personal testimony into a single dossier - and asks a court to treat a family's destroyed apartment as a crime scene with international consequences.

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