On August 1, Orin Kerr suggested that, if David Bernstein's claims of staged Qana photos were correct, then some evidence might show up on the video that was shot at the scene.
Now German TV (with English subtitles) has a short report being shown on YOUTUBE that shows just the sort of evidence that Orin wanted to see (tip to Malkin and LGF). The character who has been dubbed "Green Helmet" is shown directing a scene for the benefit of cameras at Qana.
First, the body of a child is put in an ambulance. Then "Green Helmet" is shown directing the video photographer to "Keep on filming!" and insisting that "better images must be shot."
Then (after an apparent splice in the tape) the body of what may or may not be the same child is removed from the ambulance, apparently so that "better images" can "be shot" of the body. Instead of covering up the face with a blanket, the "workers" pull the blanket to just under the chin of the dead child and manipulate the angle of the child's head so that the video photographer can get the right closeup shot of the dead child's face.
If this is what it appears to be, then it is just the smoking gun that skeptics asked for. It's interesting how much can be done when the blogosphere and the MSM (even the German MSM) work together.
Now that proof has surfaced, this story of Hezbollah manipulating the bodies of dead childen to get good propaganda photos should be a big one in the MSM over the next few days--but it probably won't be. It's amazing how anti-US and anti-Israeli propaganda can be run routinely by the American media, but when shocking and truthful stories undercut that propaganda, there's really no story worth covering.
UPDATE: Zombietime has a fairly thorough account of the various sorts of allegations being made against Reuters:
It's important to understand that there is not just a single fraudulent Reuters photograph, nor even only one kind of fraudulent photograph. There are in fact dozens of photographs whose authenticity has been questioned, and they fall into four distinct categories.The four types of photographic fraud perpetrated by Reuters photographers and editors are:
1. Digitally manipulating images after the photographs have been taken.
2. Photographing scenes staged by Hezbollah and presenting the images as if they were of authentic spontaneous news events.
3. Photographers themselves staging scenes or moving objects, and presenting photos of the set-ups as if they were naturally occurring.
4. Giving false or misleading captions to otherwise real photos that were taken at a different time or place.
2D UPDATE: AP has identified "Green Helmet" as Salam Daher, the head of civil defense for the Tyre region of Lebanon. More commentary here.
3D UPDATE: Solomania details how Daher was the source for the inflated casualty claims coming out of Qana. EU Referendum is attacking the factual claims in AP's story.
Does this mean that we should count the dead child as 1/2 of a dead child now in the scorekeeping?
Is that staging?
Is it better or worse since it doesn't include a dead child?
This is not about dead babies, this is about the credibility of Western Media.
Uh, maybe, but not based on this "staging" nonsense.
If there is proof that the kid was killed somewhere else and then brought to the scene - that would have something to do with credibility.
But if all this is about is that people are pulling dead kids out of buildings and, in the course of loading the child into the ambulance/hearse they pause and make sure that the images are captured on film that doesn't diminish the underlying fact that there is a dead kid there.
But, let us al congratulate Mr. Bernstein and his allies. He has made a 1/2 dozen posts about his issue and - at least in this tiny little chunk of the blogosphere - has suceeded for the most part in directing attention away from hundreds of dead bodies and onto the vastly less important question of "staging."
They blamed her death on Israel, since that was convenient.
Turns out someone murdered her, though their explanation is she "fell
off a swing."
But it went out to the Press and to the world as yet another child killed by Israel.
Your posts always seem to make the same tired argument: well it may be staged, but it's a dead person so the fact that we are receiving half truths shouldn't matter. I'll accept your logic then, since it's becoming obvious that, so long as we show the horror of war, it does not matter that we have to make up some of that horror.
Te, let's you and me make up some photoshop pictures of people with Israeli uniforms dancing in the street with the heads of a Palestinian woman (to heighten the fact that we are all about the horror of war and not the truth, we'll use this woman's. In the alternative, these pictures show the absolute horror that Israel's bombing campaign has wrought.
After all, regardless of how accurate the news story or photos are, isn't it really the duty of all moral people to lie if we must to get our point accross?
And before you equivocate by citing W's flight, I posit to you that there is at least a slight difference between a photo op and prancing around with dead babies to make sure that the best angle is shot.
See, for example, this photo caption (linked in www link above) of a Palestinian girl who fell off her swing in the "Mideast Conflict" section of photos (WARNING: Picture of dead girl).
Certainly, children were killed in the bombings and that is always tragic. But if there is obvious staging here, why should we believe that this boy didn't die of some other cause, and then get driven to the scene?
We've got footage of "green helmet" approaching the camera. There's no audio, and the video is slowed down. It's impossible to directly determine what he says, so we have to rely on an English translation of a German translation.
Then we see a child's corpse taken from an ambulance and moved from one stretcher to another. We're told, but given no evidence, that there's no reason for the transfer. It's insinuated, but not argued, that the transfer is the pretext for the removal.
The blanket over the kid's face is removed, and then replaced thirty seconds later. The body is made available for photographs for about fifteen seconds before it is covered up again.
Yes, it does look like the people in the photo made the child's corpse available to photographers. But it's not demonstrated that the photo-op was the reason the body was removed from the ambulance, much less that the body was manipulated in any more sinister way.
Actually, I think the main point is that it is a dead baby.
To extend that thought a bit, and although I don't think the situations are necessarily equivalent, consider whether you would object if it were an Israeli holding a dead child up to the camera, or otherwise expressing grief where a camera is obviously present. (See, for example, these photographs: 1, 2, 3.) I think you're right that the "staging" of these photos crosses the line, but I think it's a closer question than you suggest.
What makes this a "half-truth" exactly? Assuming that the whole she-bang isn't fabricated, then it seems to me that the "truth" is a bombed building and a dead kid.
But if there is obvious staging here, why should we believe that this boy didn't die of some other cause, and then get driven to the scene
I don't think the so called "staging" makes that any more or less probable.
Look, when you have two different sides firing rockets and missiles into civilian areas - that seems to be just about the most disgusting actions that could take place. Given such barbarism, staging photos is a trivial side issue.
Isn't his point rather that the horror is not made up?
Show me any of that on the Israeli side. There's been coverage of a few funerals, but they're not out there with cameras eagerly waiting to direct the media to dead bodies.
This is "manipulation"? So if the photographer were in a better position to shoot the picture the first time, then it would be all ok?
The agenda here seems pretty clear. Supporters of the Israeli war effort want to undermine any discussion, or any information, about the consequences of the particular type of war that Israel has chosen to wage. Drop a bomb and kill children - oh, forget that - the child was momentarily taken out of the ambulence, so the real issue is not the killing of the child, it is media manipulation!
I am shocked and appaled that normally intellegent and grown up human beings can convince themselves that this line of argumentation can be taken seriously. It is one thing to be a propagandist. It is quite another to be a stupid propagandist. Do you think us all fools?
"Staging" events for media play is a common political tool, used by every political faction from Hezbollah to the President of the United States. And it's been that way for decades. It doesn't necessarily make the surrounding events objectively "false".
te asks: "But if there is obvious staging here, why should we believe that this boy didn't die of some other cause, and then get driven to the scene"
By that logic, I suppose we should question whether hippies who protested at the 1968 Dem convention were really anti-war, or whether the military truly supports Bush.
Enough with the sophistry. Sure it was staged. But what's the meta-point you're all trying to make?
Is it appropriate to "stage" a photograph of a ritual of mourning? Does the act of staging such a photo call the rest of the photo into question? (Should we doubt, for instance, that the hand is the hand of a soldier?)
I expect a certain amount of cooperation between subjects and photographers in this kind of shot. This doesn't strike me as much of a story, on its face.
I am not sure what the point of that comment is but it reaks of real race hatred.
Hmm. Your argument makes perfect sense except for one small issue. Why maniupulate the photo at all? Well, for political purposes so as to present your truth in the best shade possible, even if you need to trick people in the process.
By this approach, why care about whether there are dead babies at all, isn't the fact that there is an evil regime (Israel, and by implication, the U.S. for supporting Israel) enough for us to take action against them. If you will not support such a proposition, you warmonger, I'll just draft up some photos showing you the error of your ways. And when Israel screws up and kills an innocent, I'll blare it loud and proud, showing off my death pictures like a girl looking for beads at Marti Gras. Israeli deaths? What Israeli deaths? I don't see any pictures of Israeli deaths. If I did, they are nowhere near as tragic (or front page material) as those who are martyred by the hand of evil jewish bombers.
Of course there may just be a little more going on than objectively showing the war deaths and objectively reporting on the reasons why. But that can't possibly be it. No, evil right wing pro Zionist Zealots are just out to trick us all.
The reasons for this is -- as anyone who has spent substantial time in Israel knows -- that the Israeli press is the most aggressive press there is, and simply would not stand for such manipulation. Unfortunately, we in America do not have a press that asks questions and does not allow itself to be manipulated and used by the power structure.
From an AP report August 1:
Three news agencies on Tuesday rejected challenges to the veracity of photographs of bodies taken in the aftermath of an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon, strongly denying that the images were staged.
Photographers from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse all covered rescue operations Sunday in Qana, where 56 Lebanese were killed. Many of their photos depicted rescue workers carrying dead children.
If the photos were stages, then all three "strong denials" were lies. Irrespective of whether you think the staging is important or not, explicitly denying it when it actually happened IS a big deal.
Meanwhile, the death toll of 56 (including 30 children) reported on August 1 in the article denying "staging" was soon revised down two days later to 28 (with 16 children).
The meta-point is very clear, and you are free to agree or disagree with it, but it goes like this:
"When the news reports 100 dead Lebanese children killed in an Israeli raid, do not believe them. By the next week, the facts will show that there were probably only 15, and 10 of them were likely shipped in from elsewhere, and the other five were put there by Hizballah for propoganda purposes. Do not give Hizballah the propoganda victory before the truth comes out. Make them prove that each claimed death is backed by a corpse, and make them prove that each corpse shown actually died from the cause claimed."
It's all about the burden of proof.
Anyone remember the bombed-out "factory" (I don't remember if it was in the first Gulf War or in Bill Clinton's attack on Sudan) where, for the benefit of the cameras, in the rubble there were these convenient little signs (remarkably clean and undamaged, I might add) that said "BABY MILK" in English?
For some people, the media and the badguys included, perception isn't just more important than reality; perception is reality.
2. Someone else gave journalist a chance to take a picture of that child.
Which of these acts do you find objectionable, 1, or 2?
Also, what does this tell us about U.S. "war porn" pictures like the photos of Hussein's dead sons? It's horrible if the dead are posed and photographed at the location where they are killed, but totally groovy to do it later at a morgue?
[Abusive comment removed by moderator.]
I had forgotton about those.
Do you remember he tacky, tacky gold frames. I wonder who picked those out.
These shots are significantly less "staged" than Bush's appearances in New Orleans, for instance, or the pulling down of Saddam's statue.
In any case, this sort of "staging" is incredibly common in journalism, true. I'm not aware of a single publication that doesn't allow it. It certainly doesn't carry any implications about the accuracy of the reports of those publications, since nothing inaccurate is being depicted.
It was the first Gulf War. The footage showed men walking around a factory in white lab coats that had BABY MILK FACTORY stenciled on them. Yes, in English, in what supposedly was an ordinary Iraqi factory.
I will never forget it. Truly one of the most surreal things I have ever seen.
As an illustration, they're quick to come up with "56 dead", only to see the number reduced in half. And this without any real scrutiny applied. Yes, I know, fog of war, etc. But the pattern in their actions reveals propaganda, not honest mistake. So I understand why reasonable people embrace "never trust a single word or image coming from HB" mantra.
Not exactly sure what you are referring to:
Is it
1) Israel firing missles or other weapons into civilian areas
2) Those missles or weapons striking and destroying buildings
3) Civilians being inside those buildings
4) Civilians being killed in those buildings
5) Dead civilians being removed from the rubble
6) Dead civilians being placed in ambulances or hearses.
It seems that all of this nonsense is about whether or not there is any monkeybusiness between 5) and 6).
I don't trust anything I hear from either side in a war, but from what I have read, the Israeli government readily admits to 1-4.
Those of you who use the word 'credibility' should reconsider. Staging is not the same thing as falsification. The footage is credible. It is not falsified. The debate is not over whether this is true or false, the debate is over two issues:
1. Is it proper to show people killed by violence?
2. Is it proper to show emotionally charged images?
My answer to both questions is, "yes". People need to be reminded just how horrific war is. But ultimately, it's their own choice. Proponents of Israeli policy should be showing pictures of destroyed Israeli homes and the funerals of dead Israeli civilians. Opponents of Israeli policy should be showing pictures of destroyed Lebanese homes and dead Lebanese civilians. The fact that there are more of the latter is due to the fact that there are a lot more dead Lebanese than Israelis.
2. Is it proper to show emotionally charged images?
My answer to both questions is, "yes". People need to be reminded just how horrific war is."
And if you don't get the shot right the first time, keep trotting those bodies out over and over again and shoot them in different poses and from different angles.
This is cheesy, ghoulish stagecraft that makes the horror of war into cheap political spectacle. The victims deserve more respect than to be used as props in low-rent agit-prop.
This is cheesy, ghoulish stagecraft that makes the horror of war into cheap political spectacle. The victims deserve more respect than to be used as props in low-rent agit-prop.
I certainly have some sympathy for this point of view. I too resent the way that the press sensationalizes everything. I especially hate it when a reporter thrusts his microphone into the face of some victim and asks, "How do you feel?" I no longer watch television news for this reason. So yes, sensationalism in all its forms is tawdry. In an ideal world, perhaps we'd have no television news at all, just pure print media presenting words only with no pictures. Then sound bites wouldn't be so important and we'd have a more intellectual debate.
But our world isn't ideal. The best we can do is the Jeffersonian approach: get it all out. All the ideas, all the images, all the sounds, all the videos should be out in the marketplace of ideas competing for attention. We should never suppress public information. Let it all hang out, and let citizens decide for themselves.
I'd start with 0) Hezbollah firing missiles or other weapons from civilian areas (and into civilian areas, btw, too).
But to answer your question, and clarify my point: HB saying there were N civilians killed does not mean a thing. We all know how traditionally warring parties exagerate enemy losses and diminish their own. Remember ridiculous accounts from both sides in Iraq-Iran war differing by more than an order of magnitude? Here is a different case. I have no trust in the number of civilian casualties reported by or originating with HB. And on top of shear numbers game, can we be sure that none of reported dead civilians were in fact combatants? You know, good citizen and exemplary father by day, rocket launcher by night - as seen ubiquitously in Chechnya.
I am reminded of Al Gore, who remarked, in reference to the lack of scientific objectivity in An Inconvenient Truth, that it was necessary to overstate the case, in order to motivate the people to take action.
We must keep in mind that these sort of actions are more banal than extraordinary, and temper our judgment accordingly.
ruidh:
Why is it that so many seemingly intelligent, articulate people on this blog exhibit such raving idiocy? No ruidh, it doesn't "prove" anything. But it does serve to impeach any claims of non-combatant death, infant or otherwise.
Have totally innocent individuals died as a result of this conflict? Well, that's quite likely. (However, not necessary this particular infant; the circumstances lead us to question whether he might have been "imported".) But, how many - who knows? However, from the stream of information we have gotten, much thanks to this blog, we can be reasonably certain that claims from Hezbollah are wildly exaggerated.
In the aftermath of 9-11, did the rescue crews take out the corpses so that the photographers could get better shots or stage manage the shots of the dead for maximum affect as done here? NO
And our rescue crews had a much better and more legitimate reason to do so, if they did want to.
What happened on 9-11 was evident for all. It was beneath us to deceitfully stage the shots.
Of course, "staging" in some form always occurs. But there is a great difference between, e.g. playing for a shot with the US flag in the background vs. manhandling human corpses as props in some grotesque play.
I'd submit that is beside the point here. This is a justification for 1) and the following steps.
I agree with one commenter above who argued that the green helmet guy actually helped to get the real truth of the event out. If the photographers had shown up after all the bodies had been carted away, and the only photos were of bombed buildings, would that have been a more accurate account of the event?
Point #1 is invalid in this case, as we don't know the cause of the child's death. This should be obvious.
Many have complained on these threads, of late, about how they have somehow been compelled to deal with contributors with strong and monolithic points of view.
Well, I have another complaint: That, in order to participate in a comment thread adjunct to what I consider to be an engaging post, I have to deal with such a multiplicity of [abusive epithet deleted by moderator]. I am not talking about those with views contrary to mine, mind you; I am talking about people which seem exhibit some sort of flaw in a basic ability to think clearly.
It's hardly as bad, currently as either Daily Kos, or Little Green Footballs, (In the former case, one also has to deal with raving idiot contributors.) but it is getting there.
I am curious, how does showing a dead child artificially heighten the emotive elements? Is the dead child artificial? Is his death artificial? Does the presentation of the dead child to cameramen render his death artificial? Would you require the cameraman to actually capture the instant of death in order to avoid artificiality?
Second, how does this deceitfully change the issue? What deceit is perpetrated by presenting the child's corpse to the cameramen?
Because we don't know how the child died!!!! This isn't an actual photo or a video of a child being dug out of the rubble. It is arranged after the fact. I find it incredibly amusing that, at a blog about legal issues, that some of you aren't asking, "would this hold up as evidence in court?" And the answer is no...
Not "artificial," but quite possibly (or in at least one case so far certainly) not killed by what the stagers are claiming. Or, in some cases not actually "killed" at all, just someone who died from other reasons and whose body was brought in to make things seem even more dramatic.
Odds are that the high "civilian" death rate we're hearing about now is much more along the lines of "civilian Hezbollah" fighters, with a small number of real civilians shown several times to make it look like Israel is being indiscriminate with their attacks.
In the case of the little girl who fell off the swing, the deceit is in artificially inflating the perceived number of "civilian" casualties.
It was from an interview on C-Span's Washington Journal, Tuesday or Wednesday. I'm sorry I don't currently have the time to give you any more.
Erasmussimo:
[Abusive comment deleted by MODERATOR] No, the death is likely not "artificial", but the circumstances of the death quite likely are.
[Abusive comment deleted by MODERATOR.
Kevin: you should restrain both your language and your personal attacks.]
Yeah, pretty much.
Short letter to the editor in my paper this morning:
'Regardless of your feelings about the crisis . . . even if you believe there is more culpability on Israel's part . . . the following two sentences really say it all.
'If the Arabs put down their weapons today there would be no more violence.
'If the Jews put down their weapons tdoay there would be no more Israel.'
If the goal is fewer dead babies, sorry, the zero option has been closed out. No doubt in my mind that if Israel took the view of te, Observer et al, there would be a lot more dead babies.
The AP ran a photo of a presumably Palestinian man holding the dead body of a little girl in his arms, clamiing she was killed by an Israeli military strike on August 9, 2006.
Today, on August 10, the AP ran this oh-so-insignificant correction:
EDS NOTE GRAPHIC CONTENT ** A Relative carries the body of Rajaa Abu Shaban, 5, into Shifa hospital in Gaza City, Wednesday, Aug. 9, 2006. On Thursday, doctors said that the 5-year-old Palestinian girl initially believed to have been killed by an Israeli military strike Wednesday apparently died after sustaining head injuries during a fall from a swing in the same area shortly before the strike.(AP Photo/Adel Hana)
I'm sure it's all the same to you: she's still dead, right?
I eagerly await your vociferous condemnation of Palestinian playground swings -- perhaps you can bring the matter to the UN.
Anonymous Reader
te's post above explains the likely cause of the child's death pretty well. I won't repeat it. If you have evidence to the contrary, let's see it.
Please note: that someone pulled the child out of the ambulance and lowered the sheet over their head for someone to take a picture is not convincing evidene.
First, the child, who was supposedly killed proximately by a missle blast, displays rigor and lividity consitent with being 18-24 hours postmortem.
Second, he doesn't have any apparent wounds, and no bleeding from ears or nose consistent with death from concussion.
Not proof, but it sure made me suspicious.
So if you want to maintain that it's all faked, I can't offer any reason why you must accept any of the evidence. I would expect some consistency in your skepticism, though; I would expect you to be just as skeptical of Israeli claims that Hezbollah is firing missiles at Israel, and just as skeptical of video of apparent Israeli casualties, and video of apparent Israeli funerals.
I, for one, am willing to accept most of this evidence at face value. When I see video of an Israeli funeral, I'm willing to believe that somebody really died, and that the tears in the eyes of the mourners are real. And I treat the videos of Lebanese funerals in the same manner.
1. fire the photographers who knowingly take "staged" pictures without disclosing that they have done so.
2. a dead child is still a tragedy. The fact that the Green Helmet PR guy pulled off his blanket, or brought out the kid's body again so someone else can take a picture, is not as bad as the tragedy itself, nor does it demonstrate that the child wasn't killed in the bombing. (What about the videos showing the children and others being removed from the rubble, in addition to the staging of the photos?)
3. these staged photos are probably not as bad, because not as deceitful, as the Kuwaiti ambassador's daughter giving phony, tearful testimony to the US Congress about atrocities she "suffered" in the PR run up to the first gulf war, which our own government engineered. (Remember that?) Here, at least, the child is dead due to the war, it is not an invented atrocity.
4.Nor is it as bad as recklessly or knowingly presenting "evidence" of weapons of mass destruction to justify a war. But, of course, no US government would do that, and the MSM, which obviously hates the US government, would quickly detect and expose such a manipulation.
The key passage here is "over-representation of factual presentations." Right wingers have argued that by "over-representation" Gore meant "overstatement," and by "factual representations" he meant "facts," but that's a tendentious misreading, I think.
Gore was saying that in order to get people to pay attention to solutions, they have to first be convinced that there's a problem. So while he'd prefer to spend most of his time talking about "what the solutions are," he realizes that he does have an obligation to make "factual presentations on how dangerous" the problem is.
The AP ran a photo of a presumably Palestinian man holding the dead body of a little girl in his arms, clamiing she was killed by an Israeli military strike on August 9, 2006.
Today, on August 10, the AP ran this oh-so-insignificant correction:
EDS NOTE GRAPHIC CONTENT ** A Relative carries the body of Rajaa Abu Shaban, 5, into Shifa hospital in Gaza City, Wednesday, Aug. 9, 2006. On Thursday, doctors said that the 5-year-old Palestinian girl initially believed to have been killed by an Israeli military strike Wednesday apparently died after sustaining head injuries during a fall from a swing in the same area shortly before the strike.(AP Photo/Adel Hana)
Actually, there was no correction to offer; the initial caption is still absolutely correct. They note that the "presumably Palestinian" man "claimed" that she had been killed by an Israeli air strike. The AP did not offer any confirmation or denial of the man's claims; they simply reported it as a claim, not a fact. Therefore, no correction was necessary. As always, the first bits of news to trickle in are often inaccurate. They followed up with further information unavailable at the time of the original story, reporting the true circumstances of the child's death. (Actually, we still don't really know the true circumstances of the child's death, but we have further information now.)
It's a different case and should be treated differently. This case doesn't prove anything about other cases and other cases don't prove anything about this one.
Are you at all perturbed that Arabs pretend that poor, distraught little girls were killed by military strikes, when in fact they died because they fell off of playground swings????
For the photo, please see:
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?
entry=22036_More_Death_Cult_Propaganda&only
It's quite shocking what anti-Israeli Arabs have claimed.
And don't tell me that Israeli claims should be similarly suspect: show me ONE photograph where an Israeli claimed a 5 yr old girl was killed from an Arab attack where it turned out she died from a playground accident.
Frankly, it is not surprising to me that people who would so cruelly and cynically use dead children's bodies would also do the far worse act of using them as human shields.
The Israeli IDF claimed that 150 missiles had been launched from Qana, which was a residential community. I hope that all of you who are more concerned about the fact that this child was killed will now denounce Hezbollah for that child's death. That "Green Helmet" was directing the filming in Qana tends to support reports that Hezbollah controlled Qana and press access to Qana.
That my post focused on MSM complicity in Hezbollah's propaganda campaign (see the UPDATE above for more) seemed to me a more interesting subject than simply pointing out that Hezbollah is targeting civilians in Israel or using Lebanese civilians as human shields. Terrorists killing innocent people is hardly news, even [though] it's ultimately more heinous.
Jim Lindgren
No, no, and no. I'd love to see Lindgren address the Tillman story in particular, and the Bush administration's blatant misuse of his death and outright lies about the circumstances thereof.
I am reminded of Al Gore, who remarked, in reference to the lack of scientific objectivity in An Inconvenient Truth, that it was necessary to overstate the case, in order to motivate the people to take action.
I am reminded that you are buying into right-wing talking points hook, line and sinker (a la the press buying into Hizbollah talking points --- kettle, meet pot). I am reminded that a good portion of the people here get their "news" from real, objective sources like Rush Limbaugh, PowerLine, Instputz, and Sean Hannity, not scum like Reuters and the AP.
These shots are significantly less "staged" than Bush's appearances in New Orleans, for instance, or the pulling down of Saddam's statue.
Ouch.
If an army tells me to leave my home and I don't, I have declared myself a hostile.
In terms of morality, since Hezb-allah considers my brother and his family in Jerusalem, Israeli soldiers on the northern border, and me and my kids here in Motown, to all be equally valid military targets, why should I not regard their families as the same? They have declared themselves to be my mortal enemy, openly calling for my death (yes, Hezb-allah calls for the killing of Jews, not just "Israelis"). There will only be peace when the Arabs and Muslims know they have lost - or Israel is destroyed and all the Jews their exterminated per Achmedthenutjob's pronouncements.
Here's what a wise man said during a different war against an honor culture:
HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI,
IN THE FIELD, ATLANTA, GEORGIA
September 12, 1864
JAMES M. CALHOUN, Mayor, E. E. PAWSON and S. C. WELLS, representing City Council of Atlanta.
GENTLEMEN: I have your letter of the 11th, in the nature of a petition to revoke my orders removing all the inhabitants from Atlanta. I have read it carefully, and give full credit to your statements of the distress that will be occasioned, and yet shall not revoke my orders, because they were not designed to meet the humanities of the case, but to prepare for the future struggles in which millions of good people outside of Atlanta have a deep interest. We must have peace , not only at Atlanta, but in all America. To secure this, we must stop the war that now desolates our once happy and favored country. To stop war, we must defeat the rebel armies which are arrayed against the laws and Constitution that all must respect and obey. To defeat those armies, we must prepare the way to reach them in their recesses, provided with the arms and instruments which enable us to accomplish our purpose.
Now, I know the vindictive nature of our enemy, that we may have many years of military operations from this quarter; and, therefore, deem it wise and prudent to prepare in time. The use of Atlanta for warlike purposes is inconsistent with its character as a home for families. There will be no manufactures, commerce, or agriculture here, for the maintenance of families, and sooner or later want will compel the inhabitants to go. Why not go now, when all the arrangements are completed for the transfer, instead of waiting till the plunging shot of contending armies will renew the scenes of the past month? Of course, I do not apprehend any such thing at this moment, but you do not suppose this army will be here until the war is over. I cannot discuss this subject with you fairly, because I cannot impart to you what we propose to do, but I assert that our military plans make it necessary for the inhabitants to go away, and I can only renew my offer of services to make their exodus in any direction as easy and comfortable as possible.
You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices to-day than any of you to secure peace. But you cannot have peace and a division of our country. If the United States submits to a division now, it will not stop, but will go on until we reap the fate of Mexico, which is eternal war. The United States does and must assert its authority, wherever it once had power; for, if it relaxes one bit to pressure, it is gone, and I believe that such is the national feeling. This feeling assumes various shapes, but always comes back to that of Union. Once admit the Union, once more acknowledge the authority of the national Government, and, instead of devoting your houses and streets and roads to the dread uses of war, I and this army become at once your protectors and supporters, shielding you from danger, let it come from what quarter it may. I know that a few individuals cannot resist a torrent of error and passion, such as swept the South into rebellion, but you can point out, so that we may know those who desire a government, and those who insist on war and its desolation.
You might as well appeal against the thunder-storm as against these terrible hardships of war. They are inevitable, and the only way the people of Atlanta can hope once more to live in peace and quiet at home, is to stop the war, which can only be done by admitting that it began in error and is perpetuated in pride.
We don't want your negroes, or your horses, or your houses, or your lands, or any thing you have, but we do want and will have a just obedience to the laws of the United States. That we will have, and, if it involves the destruction of your improvements, we cannot help it.
You have heretofore read public sentiment in your newspapers, that live by falsehood and excitement; and the quicker you seek for truth in other quarters, the better. I repeat then that, by the original compact of Government, the United States had certain rights in Georgia, which have never been relinquished and never will be; that the South began war by seizing forts, arsenals, mints, customhouses, etc., etc., long before Mr. Lincoln was installed, and before the South had one jot or tittle of provocation. I myself have seen in Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi, hundreds and thousands of women and children fleeing from your armies and desperadoes, hungry and with bleeding feet. In Memphis, Vicksburg, and Mississippi, we fed thousands upon thousands of the families of rebel soldiers left on our hands, and whom we could not see starve.
Now that war comes home to you, you feel very different. You deprecate its horrors, but did not feel them when you sent car-loads of soldiers and ammunition, and moulded shells and shot, to carry war into Kentucky and Tennessee, to desolate the homes of hundreds and thousands of good people who only asked to live in peace at their old homes, and under the Government of their inheritance. But these comparisons are idle. I want peace, and believe it can only be reached through union and war, and I will ever conduct war with a view to perfect and early success.
But, my dear sirs, when peace does come, you may call on me for any thing. Then will I share with you the last cracker, and watch with you to shield your homes and families against danger from every quarter.
Now you must go, and take with you the old and feeble, feed and nurse them, and build for them, in more quiet places, proper habitations to shield them against the weather until the mad passions of men cool down, and allow the Union and peace once more to settle over your old homes at Atlanta.
Yours in haste,
W. T. SHERMAN, Major-General commanding.
Or, how is it different from walking up to a reporter to be interviewed?
If the reporter or photographer does the walking, then it's okay, but if it's the other person, then it's not?
That naked Vietnamese girl -- wasn't she walking toward the photographer? Hmmmmm.
I'm struck by your blase reaction to the "presumably Palestinian" man's false claim that a 5 yr old dead girl cradled in his arms was "killed" by Israelis, when in fact she died falling off of a swing.
Would you be similarly blase if I "claimed," with a picture of a dead girl in my arms, that you killed her? Would you be as nonplussed if the AP ran that photo? How about if it ran the photo, with my crying face, and the girl's body, on page 1? And what if the photo ran without even the slightest, scantiest comment that the "claim" might be false?
I would of course presume that, the "trickle" of news, that you would be fine with the AP's conduct.
Are you fine with my conduct? What about the "presumably Palestinian" man's conduct?
Israeli Defense Force.
The same letter was in the startribune about a week ago, and completely accurate.
I offer a term failure to most here: Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus.
Moderator:
Point taken, and I shall endeavor to restrain myself in the future.
However, I must posit that my personal critiques are based upon the facts in evidence, and not ad hominem. After all, if one goes to the Farmer's Market, offering strawberries, is it wrong to call the person a strawberry farmer? Likewise, if one goes to the Free Market of Ideas, offering idiocy, what should one be called?
I'm struck by your blase reaction to the "presumably Palestinian" man's false claim that a 5 yr old dead girl cradled in his arms was "killed" by Israelis, when in fact she died falling off of a swing.
What is blase about my reaction? I recited the facts of the case. What in my comment justifies your use of the term "blase"?
And yes, in your hypothetical scenario, I would have no problems with the AP printing the statement, "Davide claims that Erasmussimo murdered his child." I would have a problem with you for lying, but not the AP. But in this case, we don't even know that the Palestinian man was lying. We cannot know his state of knowledge when he was carrying the child. He may have been sincerely mistaken, or merely repeating what somebody told him, or he may have been a secret member of Hamas who deliberately murdered his child in order to score propaganda points. But the AP made no error in reporting the facts as it knew them.
I'd like to respond the remarks about the difference between the Arabs putting down their weapons and the Israelis putting down their weapons. The comparison is fair -- but it leaves out an important point: if the Arabs put down their weapons today, the Palestinians would never get a homeland.
This disregards the simplistic fact that Israel unilaterally evacuated Gaza.
To: Moderator,
Was that civil enough for you? ;)
My favorite quote is the following:
I mean, folks, honestly, think about what you are saying. Can you imagine an American court of law ever looking to a NEWSPAPER for hard evidence? "John Doe committed the crime, your honor! It says so in last week's paper!"
The court almost never admits evidence from the mass media, because the mass media is not and has never been a source of perfect, error-free reporting. The purpose of a news story is to tell what happened. The purpose of a news photo is to show what happened.
If the news outlets behind the image of this child state there has been no staging, they mean that the photographer got a picture of the kid who was, indeed, killed in the building.
Next, my dear Kevin, for a guy who is willing to whip out the word "idiot" you sure manage to misunderstand an awful lot of your new whipping boy's point.
His argument, at least to me, seemed pretty simple. It is impossible to artificially heighten the emotionality of something as tragic as the death of a child. To that effect, in order for the emotional element of the death of a child to be artificially heightened, the death itself must be false. Thus, regardless of whether any circumstances are artificial, the death of the child in question remains equally tragic. I'm not sure how you didn't get that, but I'm going to bet that it has to do with having a strong and unbending view point.
Finally, we're talking about a war here, folks. The veracity of the modern news media at getting at the truth in any story is pretty embarrassing; why should anyone be surprised at this? Our overarching goal should remain the same. In this case, we need to figure out why noncombattant children are being killed, and we need to find out why it hasn't been halted yet.
Precisely. It can hardly be a shock to anyone that Hezbollah is doing its level best to spin the media. (The Israeli government obviously does the same.) What's shocking is that Western journalists are so uniformly and meekly accepting of Hezbollah's spin that the wire services are able to huff indignantly that their obviously staged photos are in fact not staged at all—confident that none of the journalists present at any of the staged scenes will call them on their flagrant lie. (The one exception—a German television reporter—pretty much proves the rule. What about all the other journalists who were invited to film the same scene? Why aren't they speaking up as well?)
If the press are toeing Hezbollah's line so completely as to unanimously present Hezbollah stagings as real-life events, then what else about the conflict are they distorting, at Hezbollah's request? The body counts? The damage? Hezbollah's popularity? Their behavior towards the local population? We can't really know, because the people we expect to tell us—the ones we'd like to trust not to give us one side's canned propaganda—have proven themselves completely untrustworthy. That should disturb even (indeed, especially) those who find the accounts of the war in the mainstream press so far to be completely plausible.
E-freaking-gad!!! You are positing that the circumstances of a child's (or any other) death doesn't effect its emotional impact?!?!?! Just what planet do you come from?!?!?!
There's a common thread running through a lot of the --- for want of a better phrase --- pro-Israel posts here. I'm referring to a sense that "staged" or not, there's something unseemly, inappropriate, or worse about the eagerness of Lebanese survivors to present their dead to be photographed. A sense that someone who would offer the body of a child to a photojournalist is necessarily a ghoul --- perhaps even a barbarian --- and most likely a callous manipulator, willing to lie and deceive.
I can't speak to why Middle Eastern Muslims seem to be, in general, more willing to allow their dead to be photographed than Middle Eastern Jews, or Europeans, or Americans. I can, though, say this:
If my three-year-old daughter was killed by an airstrike, and I believed that I could get justice or vengeance for her death by publicizing it, I would parade her body in front of every photographer and journalist I could find. Put her in the ambulance, take her out of the ambulance, put her back in again --- I don't care.
So you don't make much headway with me by saying that the video shows "cheesy, ghoulish stagecraft," or that "the victims deserve more respect." As a father, I say no.
"Let God sort them out" and "Allah knows his own" - meaning, God will send Infidels to Hell, and save True, Faithful Muslims for Paradise. Theu believe they are doing their own a positive good!
Our evil enemy are using your Christian (derived) guilt to demoralize and disarm you in their war against democractic, successful, moral state of Israel. (And even the 1.2 million Arab-Israeli's DO NOT want to join some Pale or Jordan state, by huge majoriities!)
DO YOU IDJITS not see that you are being manipulated into agreeing with a cause that wants you dead! WE ARE evil INFIDELS!
WAKE UP!
I just did, and since I happen to speak German, I also followed the actual voice over, not just the overlays.
Let's just be clear what happened:
- he's there, helmet in hand, when the kid is lifted into the ambulance.
- he talks to a bystander.
- he orders the news photographer to kepp rolling
- he tells the photographer "We need better pictures here."
- the kid is taken back out of the ambulance
- GH comes back with helmet on
- the kid is transferred to a different gurney
- onlookers are cleared out
- GH kneels down, arranges the blanket several different ways while photographer keeps shooting
- GH holds the kids head, turns it for a better shot (notice here that turning the head raises the kid's whole body, including the left arm; clear, and pretty advanced rigor. Look at the purple marks on the arms and face, also: that looks like lividity.)
- then they put the body back.
This is not someone giving a moment to show a body --- this is a lengthy, extended display for photography.
This post would be more accurately headlined "PROOF OF THE AUTHENTICY OF PHOTOS OF DEAD CHILDREN BY GREEN HELMET"... Jim, you clearly don't understand the definition of "staged".
That may get deleted. Oh well, on to the meat.
No, Kev-my-man, I was not "positing" any such thing, though I'm happy you managed to misinterpret me. I feel so vindicated now!
I was merely attempting to put Erasmus's words into a context that you might understand. While I may or may not agree with the idea that the death of a child is so tragic that any additional circumstances become essentially meaningless, I do figure there are an awful lot of people who do feel that way. Mothers, for example.
So I guess, in answer to your question (or at least to the question that you were really asking), people who might feel such a way come from Venus.
You, obviously, come from Mars.
I know I'm taking this out of context, but it's worth repeating:
All the video that prompted this thread purports to show is that a child's corpse was put in an ambulance, then taken out again and presented to photographers. Despite Richard Bellamy, SP, and others' insinuations, there's nothing in the video that suggests that the circumstances of the death were other than what was claimed.
Folks are, of course, free to suggest that other deceptions, or the perfidy of "green helmet," or the innate viciousness of the Arabs renders it likely that this child was killed in circumstances other than an Israeli airstrike, but the fact remains that this video provides no evidence to support that conclusion.
I count about fifteen seconds from when the crowd parts to give the video camera access to when someone covers the child with the blanket.
They purposely mix in with civilians hoping that civilians will get killed. Say it again: they try to get civilians killed shooting rockets off people's driveways.
They prevent civilians from leaving, after the Israelis drop leaflets telling them when and where they will bomb.
Why do you always gave to turn everything into an ad hominem attack?
You quoted another commenter and then commented yourself:
I wasn't even blogging when either of those stories happened.
1. Lying on the citations for the posthumous medals for Tillman was reprehensible, and it apparently went far up in the Army's command. Tillman's father said it eloquently:
Whether I would have blogged on it depends on whether it was being adequately covered on VC.
2. As for the Jessica Lynch story, I probably would have blogged about that, had I been a blogger at the time.
The press coverage of her homecoming was over-the-top. With so many brave soldiers coming home, I thought the extraordinary emphasis on Lynch to be extremely odd. Further, the extensive TV coverage of the home-town parade was strange because, of course, there was so little that could be said in covering it. I still don't understand how the press could have lost its judgment on that one.
One thing I noticed, however, is that Bush didn't attend the parade or have a big White House or Pentagon ceremony. I thought it nicely illustrated some of the differences between Bush's personal style and Clinton's (ie, the big public reception for Scott O'Grady, the rescued pilot).
Of course there's a counter available--the press can simply refuse to go along with the game, and dare the authority in question to ban all journalists.
Let's take your analogy as an example. You appear to have a particular instance in mind of a reporter being denied a White House press pass after filing unflattering reports about the administration. I've not heard of any such case, but even if it happened, the rest of the White House press corps hardly responded by ceasing all unflattering reports about the administration. On the contrary, they continued to report as before, and of course the White House could hardly revoke all of their credentials--there'd be nobody left to relay the White House's spin in any form, even with unflattering commentary.
Likewise, self-respecting journalists working in foreign countries ought to refuse to report under conditions where their freedom to report the facts as they find them is seriously restricted. And those who bargain away that freedom for "access" (as Eason Jordan famously did to get CNN into Saddam Hussein's Iraq) deserve all the opprobrium they get. Likewise for those journalists who accept such restrictions because they sympathize with the cause of those enforcing the restrictions.
Apparently, at least one German television outlet had the integrity to report events in Lebanon as they actually saw them, not as Hezbollah wished them to be reported. We shall see what happens to them--but it's shameful that so few other journalists have similarly honored their first and most important responsibility to their audience.
Thanks for two great (and powerful) comments.
Jim Lindgren
h/t, the even keeled Solomonia.
A previous comment of yours stated, and your most recent one continues to imply, that the White House has pulled the press credentials of a reported to an unfriendly report. The only case of press credential revocation I'm aware of is the ex-gay prostitute (Jeff something?), but that was different (he was accused of writing firendly reports for a conservative outlet). Who is the reporter (or reporters) that have lost White House priviledges due to unfirendly reporting?
I spent the first seven years of my career as a newspaper staff writer. I worked at a tabloid and at a "mainstream" daily.
Years ago most journalists at quality newspapers worked hard to tell the "true story." Meanwhile, the key to effective tabloid writing in those days was that a story didn't have to be true to print it -- someone just had to say it was true.
Today many in the mainstream media use tabloid tactics.
That change puts democracy at risk. The situation should worry both the political left and the political right. Voters can't make the right decisions if they have bad information. Garbage in, garbage out.
Here's a choice quote:
Yawn
Good, my meat is looking for a good stroking. ;)
But, in any event - 'bout time spades started bein' called spades.
misinterpret? How so?
Oh, so glad to hear. But, as you folks are so monotone, do you really think it was required?
Oh yes, some childhood deaths are really happy affairs.
Oh, yes, we should just let all those baby-killers go free - it was all so meaningless.
Oh yeah, gotta' get the mothers in there - no good piece of baby-killing demagoguery is complete without the mothers.
It is only true that you are from some planet alien to the majority of us. The specifics are up for speculation.
Except there is at least one camera cut in there. And it's done after pulling the cadaver back out of the ambulance. And it's including some guy in a green helmet who isn't one of the rescuers, but is instead directing the photographers and posing with the body.
If you see a guy standing on a dock with a swordfish, is it less "staged" because the photo takes just a few seconds to make?
You didn't mention me; I'm hurt. But likely it's because I was pointing out actual evidence within the video that something --- ie, the condition of the cadaver --- didn't seem to fit the reported circumstances.
Erasmussino:
You know, it might be risky, but I don't think you'd actually hurt yourself if you made the leap from a warning that if they showed something they'd be killed, and saying they threaten to kill reporters who don't go along.
In fact, I rather think you're more likely to hurt yourself executing the one-and-a-helf gainer with a twist, blindfolded, it requires to not see the connection.