2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict photographs controversies

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The 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict photographs controversies refers to allegations that some instances of photojournalism from the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict misrepresented scenes of death and destruction in Lebanon caused by Israeli air attacks. The controversy began as an investigation of documents by individual bloggers and then spread to print and television media sources.^[1] It led to the Reuters news organization firing one of its freelance photographers, Adnan Hajj, and implementing stricter controls on its photo-gathering process.

Four types of misleading photojournalism have been alleged as part of the controversy: photo manipulation using computer software, photo staging by press photographers, photo staging by others at the scene, and false or misleading captioning of unstaged photos. The media watchdog group CAMERA claims that the distortions reflect a bias in favor of Hezbollah and against Israel and the Israel Defense Forces.^[2]

1 Photo manipulation
2 Allegations of staging by press photographers
3 Allegations of photo staging by others
4 Alleged ambulance attack controversy
5 Allegations of improper captioning
- 5.1 Bruno Stevens photos
6 See also
7 References

[edit] Photo manipulation

Main article: Adnan Hajj photographs controversy

One of Adnan Hajj's altered photos.

On August 6, 2006, during the Israel-Lebanon conflict, Reuters fired Adnan Hajj, a freelance photographer, after he admitted using Photoshop to add and darken smoke spirals in photographs of Beirut, in order to make the damage appear worse.^[3] Reuters stated that Hajj had edited another photo, and critics raised further questions about Hajj's work.^[4] Reuters announced that they had withdrawn "all of Hajj's photos, about 920 images, from its archives"^[3], but several of Hajj's images^[5]^[6] including one taken in Lebanon^[7] are still present on Reuters' website, several months after.

[edit] Allegations of staging by press photographers

A photo of a burning Qur'an amid a pile of rubble, also taken by Hajj, seemed suspicious to Los Angeles Times media critic Tim Rutten, since the building it was in had been destroyed in an Israeli airstrike hours beforehand, and everything else in the photo was already ash. ^[8] A number of photographs were taken from Lebanon showing a children's toy in the foreground, surrounded by a pile of rubble.^[9] ^[10] ^[11] Rutten also wrote about this set, saying that "Reuters might want to check its freelancers' expenses for unexplained Toys R Us purchases."^[8]

Similarly, questions were raised about photographs of seemingly pristine snapshots and photo albums lying undisturbed on the top of the rubble of buildings destroyed by Israeli missiles. Media watchdog group CAMERA wrote, "how often does one find intact photographs sitting alone and undisturbed on top of the ruins of a building levelled by a missile? But coincidentally or not, photographers from various news organizations have been finding just that in rubble all over Lebanon."^[2]

[edit] Allegations of photo staging by others

Many allegations of staging by those other than press photographers involve Salam Daher, the head of the South Lebanon civil defense organisation, who appeared in many press photos after the 2006 Qana airstrike holding up a dead girl's body. He was seen wearing a green helmet and the uniform of a rescue worker. However, he has been alleged to be a Hezbollah operative who is manipulating press coverage to create anti-Israel sympathy by bloggers including Richard A. E. North.^[12] North dubbed him "Mr. Green Helmet" and claimed that he seemed to be posing for photos for a longer period of time than a legitimate rescue worker would.^[13] A German television station, NDR, in a program called "Zapp", subsequently showed footage in which he appeared to be directing the filming of the rescue effort (giving instructions to the cameraman to keep filming and removing a boy's body that was already put in an ambulance, in order to take more pictures of it), and called him a "cynical movie director."^[14] In response, the Associated Press published a sympathetic profile about him, in which he denied the Hezbollah allegations, stating, "I am just a civil defense worker. I have done this job all my life." The story was accompanied by a photograph in which Daher posed wearing a clean, new blue helmet and body armor of the type generally worn by members of the press, rather than his characteristic green gear. The article did not explain how Daher obtained the new material during the war, or if it was actually his.^[15] In a second AP article, Daher admitted he had posed for cameras with some bodies, saying, "I wanted people to see who was dying. They said they were killing fighters. They killed children."^[16]

On August 8, CNN anchor Anderson Cooper reported about a Hezbollah press tour of a bombed-out area in southern Beirut on 23 July 2006 that Hezbollah operatives had paraded around a group of empty ambulances, with sirens sounding and lights flashing, in front of press photographers, to give the false impression that they were involved in treating civilian casualties.^[17] CNN Senior Producer Charlie Moore described the same tour as a "dog-and-pony show" due to perceived staging, misrepresentation of the nature of the destroyed areas, and a strict directive about when and with whom interviews could take place.^[18]

[edit] Alleged ambulance attack controversy

After the International Committee of the Red Cross issued a statement saying that "two of its ambulances were struck by [Israeli] munitions, although both vehicles were clearly marked" on 23 July 2006, wounding nine people,^[19] the Associated Press reported that "Israeli jets blasted two ambulances with rockets" according to "Ali Deebe, a Red Cross spokesman in Tyre".^[20] The story quickly spread to many other news outlets around the world. The Boston Globe quoted Kasim Shaalan as saying "A big fire came toward me, like in a dream" after a "rocket or missile had made a direct hit through the roof".^[21]. Photos and video taken of an ambulance alleged to be one of the two in question, after the alleged attack, show a hole directly in the very center of the cross on the ambulance's roof, inside a hole that normally fitted a red dome light that was entirely missing.

A controversy developed when 'zombie', the pseudonymous owner of the zombietime website, posted a long essay arguing (among other things) that the damage to the ambulances was far too light for a missile strike.^[22]

On August 28, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said, "after closer study of the images of the damage to the ambulance, it is beyond serious dispute that this episode has all the makings of a hoax,"^[23] a conclusion he later said he drew from initial reports.^[24] On August 30, the ICRC "rebuked" Downer rebuked Foreign Minister Alexander Downer "for relying on an unverified internet blog" and said that "there was no evidence to support" the hoax claim.^[25]^[26] Downer stood by his charge.^[27] Martin Chulov, a reporter for The Australian wrote of visiting Tyre and inspecting both ambulances on 24 July 2006 and claimed that Downer's source was "a right-wing Florida-based website, zombietime.com ... a blog".^[28]^[26] Andrew Bolt, a conservative Australian columnist who had written a column describing reporters as "passing on as fact the propaganda of terrorists",^[29] defended Downer,^[30] and pointed out that later reports claiming that the ambulances were hit by small arms fire contradicted the original reports.^[31] He also printed a report from "a military source" which stated that:^[32]

There is no weapon that would deliver terminal effects consistent with the pictures, the alleged story and the reputed damage done to ambulance and people.

In December 2006, Human Rights Watch released the results of their investigation into these allegations, in which they acknowledged having "originally reported that the ambulances had been struck by missiles fired from an Israeli airplane, but that conclusion was incorrect". They now claimed that the ambulances were hit by a "smaller type of missile", possibly a "SPIKE anti-armor missile" or "the still experimental DIME (dense inert metal explosive) missile."^[33]

In a detailed rebuttal, 'zombie' argued that SPIKE and DIME missiles both would have obliterated the ambulance and concluded "[f]or me at least, Human Rights Watch's new report failed to make its case."^[34]

[edit] Allegations of improper captioning

Photographs submitted to Reuters and Associated Press showed one Lebanese woman mourning on two different pictures taken by two photographers, allegedly taken two weeks apart. ^[35]

The New York Times improperly captioned a photo taken in the city of Tyre in its online edition; an injured rescue worker being lifted from the rubble was implied to have been a bombing victim when in fact the worker had slipped and fallen. The newspaper subsequently issued a correction, saying that the photo had appeared in the printed edition with the correct caption. ^[36] The Times never explained, however, how an allegedly unconscious man could keep a green hat carefully wedged between his hip and his elbow while being yanked upright, a hat he had been wearing on his head in all previous photographs.

[edit] Bruno Stevens photos

A set of photos taken by press photographer Bruno Stevens show a Lebanese gunman with a raging fire in the background. One such photo appeared on the cover of the July 31 issue of U.S. News & World Report, with the inside caption, "Hezbollah guerilla poses at the site of an Israeli attack near Beirut". Another one was published in the July 31 issue of Time, with a caption saying the fire came from the "wreckage of a downed Israeli jet." The photos' captioning quickly attracted controversy, with some commentators stating that the fire in the background appeared to be nothing more than a large pile of burning tires.^[37]^[38]

On November 11, 2006 Stevens, on the online forum "Lightstalkers", attempted to explain the controversy.^[39] He wrote that he had originally given one of the photos the following caption:

“Kfar Chima, near Beirut, July 17, 2006 An Israeli Air Force F16 has allegedly been shot down while bombing a group of Hezbollah owned trucks, at least one of these trucks contained a medium range ground to ground missile launcher.”

He wrote that sometime later, after having done more investigation, he had modified his caption to:

“Kfar Chima, near Beirut, July 17, 2006 The Israeli Air Force bombed a group of Hezbollah chartered trucks parked on the back of large Lebanese Army barracks , at least one of these trucks contained a medium range ground to ground missile launcher, at least one missile was hit, misfiring high into the sky before falling down and starting a huge fire in the barracks’ parking lot.”

In his post, he wrote that he had had no say in the magazines' captions. He also reaffirmed the validity of his second caption, stating that the fire did not come from a garbage dump and was indeed the result of an Israeli attack; though he considered the site "a very legitimate target for the Israeli Air Force."