Snapped Shot

Just ran across a familiar face in the wire archives—The gentleman in these two photographs seems to have a knack for showing up at the front of funerals for Islamic Jihad terrorists "Activists."

5 March 2008—Palestinians shout during the funeral of Islamic Jihad militant Yosuf al-Samera in the central Gaza Strip March 5, 2008. Al-Samera was killed by Israeli forces late on Tuesday, medical workers said. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa (GAZA) (Second angle from Khalil Hamra/AP.)

16 March 2008—A Palestinian shouts as he helps to carry the body of Islamic Jihad militant Mohammed al-Shair during his funeral in the southern Gaza Strip March 16, 2008. Al-Shair was among three Palestinian militants killed by Israel's air force's missile strike in the northern Gaza Strip on Saturday, hospital officials said. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa (GAZA)

Same photographer. Same subject. And I haven't even gone back more than a month in the photo archives.

Could this be this yet another case where the wire services selectively ignore the insincerity of the subject's repetitive emotions, and try to present him to the reader as if he has something legitimate to say?

I'd show you the pictures here, but you know the deal. Be sure to click on the links up above while you can.

Update: Okay, I guess this means it's my turn to borrow a page from CJ's Playbook:

It's amazing how the number of the "martyred" in any given Israeli "attack" tends to swell upon each retelling. For example, here's what the Associated Press reported earlier today:



Not to be left out of the latest Jihadi du jour, Reuters was on the scene as well. Their report, however, is slightly different than the AP's telling of the story:



All this aside, it is pretty clear (WARNING: Morgue shots) exactly how many Hamas militants were killed in this strike, which makes Reuters' exaggeration of the story somewhat befuddling.

Aha, that's what it is—Reuters is grouping two additional jihadis in their body count, but attaching it to an irrelevant photograph. The people in the picture above (notice that the same man is present in the two main photos presented here) weren't necessarily being "told" that "up to eight" Hamasiacs had been killed, but rather had just gotten out from seeing the six present.

Reuters is still wrong, by the way. Only six were killed in an airstrike. The other two, as the AP correctly points out, were killed in "clashes with troops."

Two huzzahs for that vaunted fact-checking.

AFP photographer Sayyed al-Kateib was injured in the great Palestinian/Egyptian conflict today. From the looks of it, he got hit in the back of a head by a rock—and while Reuters doesn't seem to think that merits a mention, there is one group in particular that happens to have a proclivity for throwing those (be sure to scroll down).



By the way, incidents like this aren't too surprising, when one considers which side the press tends to hang out with.

Here's another, more detailed angle of Mr. al-Katieb's injury, thanks to eagle-eyed reader Ulrike and Spiegel Online. Ulrike asks,

The blood on the hand seems to be red paint. Compare it to the postetd pc: the blood from the head-wound ist noticably darker than the red colored hand.

Can anybody shed some light on this?

Zooming in on the photo, the colour on his hand seems to be a reasonable match for the colour of the blood that's streaming down the side of his head, so I don't see any obvious reason to declare this fauxtography. See the detail below:



It's not 100% proof, but the inverted regions of the photograph are in almost the same exact hue, which seems to indicate to me that whatever's on his hand came from the wound on his head. The inversion also highlights his wound pretty dramatically, some of which you can see in the inverted area there.

If anyone has more convincing evidence either way, I'm open to suggestions. I'm not claiming that this is a scientific conclusion or anything.

He definitely seems to be genuinely injured, and I don't think the substance on his hand is paint. The only question then is how he got injured—and I think my original supposition that it was an easily-identified flying object is still on the mark.

Our eternal allies in Egypt seem to have a "slight" problem on their hands:



I'm tracking the photos beyond the fold. Continue reading »

Hamas once again manipulates the entire population of the Gaza Strip into yet another photogenic mass rally "demanding" yet again that Israel ignore all of the crimes Hamas has committed against it and end the (rather gentle) embargo (more, more) against the terrorist entity.



The key has a very specific meaning, by the way. Also note that today's Friday, the Islamic day of prayer, so it's not like Hamas had to work very hard to get these loyal citizens out of their already-quite-mob-inciting mosques.

Update: Is this yet another anti-Annapolis protest? Some of the captions coming in indicate that this is the case, making this roughly Day 4 of Annapolis rage. Continue reading »

Whenever I see situations like this, I just have to wonder: If we have photojournalists putting out such obvious duplicates as this from the Palestinian territories—Why do we bother sending any photographers there at all? I think the fact that this "clustering" of photojournalists happens so often is certainly indicative of us having—at the very least—a few too many stationed there.

Exhibit A:

REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa (GAZA)

(AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)

Related: The Elder has more on this story, if you're interested. Continue reading »

Yesterday:



Today:



Gee, what ever happened to all of that business about Israel hitting a "police position?"

And thus, the crocodile tears flowed immediately forth.

Update: Aha, that explains it!