8/6/2006: Beirut Photoshop

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by Spexxvet

Or Jesus/God

Indeed.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Al Jazzera video proves that the tire fire mentioned above was caused by a misfired Hezbollah missile

Well the video is no longer available, but a few days ago the actual photographer of the original US News cover shot came forward on Lightstalkers, a professional news photographers site. Bruno Stevens explained the details behind this shot:



This is the shot that made the US News cover.



Stevens submitted the shot with the caption:

Kfar Chima, near Beirut, July 17, 2006. An Israeli Air Force F16 has alledgedly 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.

Maybe the meaning of "allegedly" got lost because he misspelled it. After returning to the site and gathering more details, he then submitted a more complete caption:

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.

This correlates with what people figured out from the Al Jazzera video. Stevens also shot the now-dead missile launcher inside the targeted truck:

This is a very important piece of evidence showing probable collusion between Hezbollah and the Lebanese Army, there is little doubt that the Lebanese Army was aware of the presence of at least one missile launcher and at least one large missile on their parking lot. The size of the launcher, destroyed a couple of days later from the ground by an unknown party suggest missiles 10 to 14 meters long.

A few days after he submitted all of the above, the top pic appeared in Time, and as is the usual practice, editors re-wrote Stevens' caption.

The wreckage of a downed Israeli jet that was targeting Hizballah trucks billows smoke behind a Hizballah gunman in Kfar Chima, near Beirut. Jet fuel set the surrounding area ablaze.

Got that? The fine detail from the photographer who was actually there, was discarded, in favor of a suitable narrative. Hizballah shot the jet down. Missile launching trucks became simple trucks. A legitimate military target was whitewashed out, the photo of the evidence is not reprinted. The ruin was the result of Israeli actions and not a Hezb misfire as they probably tried to launch at the last minute and fucked up.

Now people are calling Stevens anti-semitic because they don't know he didn't write that caption. Seems to me he did good work documenting what happened and revisiting the location several times to collect facts. Too bad the facts became a casualty.

There were 6 to 8 large articulated trucks parked there, making it a very legitimate target for the Israeli Air Force, quite far away from civilian houses. Guilad, I can’t see why showing and explaining this makes me antisemitic or even anti-Israeli. Quite, quite, the contrary in fact.

[SPUCK]

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