Sally Faulkner offered a man a simple glass of water. Next thing she knew, her child was 'taken away'.

Brisbane mother Sally Faulkner, who was at the centre of a bungled attempted child abduction with a 60 Minutes crew, has alleged her ex-husband Ali Elamine had previously taken their daughter away from her at just ten months old.

Speaking to Australian Story, which airs at 8pm tonight on ABC, Faulker shares the romance turned rocky relationship with Elamine, and how the alleged incident began with the simple offer of a glass of water.

“Ali’s parents, they lived in a beautiful house two hours outside of Beirut,” she said.

“There was an incident at the house… involving a painter that was at the house during renovations.

“The maid went to give him water, I said, ‘oh, I’ll take it to him’ because I was going downstairs.

“I handed him the water, he looked down at me and smiled and that was it.”

The mother-of-three describes how the gesture held grave consequences for her relationship with the Elamine family.

"His family and Ali consider that as a big mistake, you know I shouldn’t have even made contact in that way," she said.

"And that's basically what started all of the fight, between us."

Faulkner relays how the incident led to the first instance where her daughter, Lahela, then only 10 months old, was forcibly taken from her.

She said the pair had packed Lahela's things into the car when Elamine asked her to pass their child over to his mother for a hug.

“I handed her over, she took her... she took her and walked into the house," she said.

"And my eyes just widened, my heart just started beating faster. I said, 'what's going on?' and he said, 'Lahela's staying here'.

"I said, 'no she was only ten months old, nearly 11'.

“We drove back for two hours and there was not really a word said, but I cried.”

The full story behind the events that led to a botched child abduction and a Channel 9 crew being detained in Lebanon will air at 8pm on Monday on ABC.