The Volokh Conspiracy - New Brief Lebanon Media Notes:

Little Green Footballs reports that photographer Bryan Denton was an eyewitness in Lebanon to, in Denton's words, "the daily practice of directed shots, one case where a group of wire photogs were choreographing the unearthing of bodies, directing emergency workers here and there, asking them to position bodies just so, even remove bodies that have already been put in graves so that they can photograph them in peoples arms."

And Tim Rutten, media columnist for the L.A. Times, thinks that the MSM is not paying sufficient attention to bloggers' revelations that many photos from Lebanon were digitally manipulated, staged, posed, captioned incorrectly, or were otherwise fraudulent. He concludes:

That brings us to the most troubling of the possible explanations for these fraudulent photos, which is that some of the photojournalists involved are either intimidated by or sympathetic to the Hezbollah terrorists. It's a possibility fraught with harsh implications, but it needs to be examined thoroughly and openly. [Charles] Johnson [of LGF] and his colleagues have done the serious news media a service. Failure to follow up on it would be worse than churlish; it would be irresponsible.

UPDATE: Washington Post photographer Michael Robinson-Chavez, who was there, says of Qana: "Nothing was set up. There was no way photos could have been altered with a dozen photographers there." Yet we have video of "Green Helmet" apparently directing photographers and rescue workers, an AP report (in a puff piece) of Green Helmet holding up a dead body for the cameras, and some pretty persuasive (warning: and gory) circumstantial evidence from EU Referendum. Even the Post ombudsman thinks that one photo from Reuters looks staged. I guess it depends on what Robinson Chavez means by "set up", and also exactly where he was and how much of everything he witnessed (given that only a few images out of hundreds, maybe thousands, shot at Qana are at issue).

[UPDATE: A reader points out that, read in context, Robinson-Chavez may only be denying that the children were trucked in from somewhere else, or that some of the "dead" bodies really weren't, both allegations circulating on the internet. The full quote is "Everyone was dead, many of them children. Nothing was set up. There was no way photos could have been altered with a dozen photographers there." As the reader points out, this falls rather short of a direct denial of "staging.")

Meanwhile, Robinson-Chavez "explained why readers don't see pictures of suspected Hezbollah guerrillas, whose stronghold is southern Lebanon. They are recognizable because they're young and bearded and have walkie-talkies — and don't want to be photographed. He said they intentionally are not armed when photographers are around. He was detained by several one day and then released." Personally, if I were "detained" by an anti-American terrorist group, I'd be scared out of my wits, and would go out of my way not to make nice to that group so long as I was in the territory they controlled. And that would include what photos and reporting I chose to send to my bosses back in the U.S.

	[David Bernstein, August 12, 2006 at 10:38pm] Trackbacks New Brief Lebanon Media Notes: Little Green Footballs reports that photographer Bryan Denton was an eyewitness in Lebanon to, in Denton's words, "the daily practice of directed shots, one case where a group of wire photogs were choreographing the unearthing of bodies, directing emergency workers here and there, asking them to position bodies just so, even remove bodies that have already been put in graves so that they can photograph them in peoples arms." And Tim Rutten, media columnist for the L.A. Times, thinks that the MSM is not paying sufficient attention to bloggers' revelations that many photos from Lebanon were digitally manipulated, staged, posed, captioned incorrectly, or were otherwise fraudulent. He concludes: That brings us to the most troubling of the possible explanations for these fraudulent photos, which is that some of the photojournalists involved are either intimidated by or sympathetic to the Hezbollah terrorists. It's a possibility fraught with harsh implications, but it needs to be examined thoroughly and openly. [Charles] Johnson [of LGF] and his colleagues have done the serious news media a service. Failure to follow up on it would be worse than churlish; it would be irresponsible. UPDATE: Washington Post photographer Michael Robinson-Chavez, who was there, says of Qana: "Nothing was set up. There was no way photos could have been altered with a dozen photographers there." Yet we have video of "Green Helmet" apparently directing photographers and rescue workers, an AP report (in a puff piece) of Green Helmet holding up a dead body for the cameras, and some pretty persuasive (warning: and gory) circumstantial evidence from EU Referendum. Even the Post ombudsman thinks that one photo from Reuters looks staged. I guess it depends on what Robinson Chavez means by "set up", and also exactly where he was and how much of everything he witnessed (given that only a few images out of hundreds, maybe thousands, shot at Qana are at issue). [UPDATE: A reader points out that, read in context, Robinson-Chavez may only be denying that the children were trucked in from somewhere else, or that some of the "dead" bodies really weren't, both allegations circulating on the internet. The full quote is "Everyone was dead, many of them children. Nothing was set up. There was no way photos could have been altered with a dozen photographers there." As the reader points out, this falls rather short of a direct denial of "staging.") Meanwhile, Robinson-Chavez "explained why readers don't see pictures of suspected Hezbollah guerrillas, whose stronghold is southern Lebanon. They are recognizable because they're young and bearded and have walkie-talkies — and don't want to be photographed. He said they intentionally are not armed when photographers are around. He was detained by several one day and then released." Personally, if I were "detained" by an anti-American terrorist group, I'd be scared out of my wits, and would go out of my way not to make nice to that group so long as I was in the territory they controlled. And that would include what photos and reporting I chose to send to my bosses back in the U.S.