Clowns to the left of me, moonbats to the right

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED:

Conspiracy theories don't get generated only by lefties. The rightwingnutosphere continues to push its theory that the tragedy at Qana was not caused by Israel's bombardment but by Hezbollah, or dumb civilians not moving fast enough, or by ... uh ... bad voodoo?

For background, see this post and the comments.

Anyway, it's at the point where the Jerusalem Post can't ignore it -- probably due to reader pressure -- despite any hints, suggestions or evidence from the apologetic Israeli government that it isn't true.

At a press conference on Sunday night, Air Force Chief of Staff Brig.-Gen. Amir Eshel said the building was struck by IAF missiles a little after midnight, but only collapsed seven hours later, at about 7 a.m.

Eshel said he could not explain what caused the structure to collapse so many hours after it was hit, and speculated, while stressing that he had no conclusive evidence, about whether Hizbullah had played a role in what had transpired, perhaps by firing on the building itself.

Another possibility that has been raised is that the building sustained damage from the original strike, but collapsed only later from structural damage or the impact of further IAF strikes nearby. Alternatively, the building may have contained Hizbullah weaponry that detonated after the strike.

The reason this smells of conspiracy is because the bloggers, who did not actually visit the bombed building and were not present when the rescue took place, are speculating on a few snippets from Eshel and a sequence of news photos.

Do they honestly believe that every single MSM journo at the scene is in on this conspiracy, or has been duped?

Woooooooo. Earth to pajamahadeen.

The Washington Post's Jefferson Morley asks some really good questions here. (Emphasis and links are mine.)

The follow-up questions for the bloggers touting the alternative theory are obvious:

Who killed the Hashems and Shalhoubs, if it wasn't an Israel bomb? Korvet and the other bloggers don't offer any theories.

How did Hezbollah truck in bodies to the Qana site without the pervasive Israeli aerial surveillance catching it on film? Israel has released footage of what it says are Hezbollah fighters firing rockets from the area. Presumably, the Israeli Foreign Ministry is not covering up the story.

As for EU Referendum's claim that a Lebanese rescue worker seen in many photos from Qana was a "Hezbollah official," I e-mailed co-author of the site, Richard North, to ask for his evidence.

"All I have to go on is gut instinct," North replied.*

I appreciate his candor. It confirms that he has no evidence to support the central claim of his blog posts.

North says he is just trying to "raise questions," which is certainly a legitimate goal. My question is: What is it about the photos from Qana that made Israel's supporters prefer fantasy to fact?

One more thing: One of the key pieces of ''evidence'' the Keyboard Kommandos are presenting is the time-coding of news photos. Shows how much they know about the business. Here that gets all straightened out.

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.

A British Web site, the EU Referendum blog, built an argument that chicanery may have been involved by citing time stamps that went with captions of the photographs.

For example, the Web site draws attention to a photo by AP's Lefteris Pitarakis time stamped 7:21 a.m., showing a dead girl in an ambulance. Another picture, stamped 10:25 a.m. and taken by AP's Mohammed Zaatari, shows the same girl being loaded onto the ambulance. In a third, by AP photographer Nasser Nasser and stamped 10:44 a.m., a rescue worker carries the girl with no ambulance nearby.

The site suggests these events were staged for effect, a criticism echoed by talk show host Rush Limbaugh when he directed listeners to the blog on Monday.

"These photographers are obviously willing to participate in propaganda," Limbaugh said. "They know exactly what's being done, all these photos, bringing the bodies out of the rubble, posing them for the cameras, it's all staged. Every bit of it is staged and the still photographers know it."

The AP said information from its photo editors showed the events were not staged, and that the time stamps could be misleading for several reasons, including that web sites can use such stamps to show when pictures are posted, not taken. An AFP executive said he was stunned to be questioned about it. Reuters, in a statement, said it categorically rejects any such suggestion.

"It's hard to imagine how someone sitting in an air-conditioned office or broadcast studio many thousands of miles from the scene can decide what occurred on the ground with any degree of accuracy," said Kathleen Carroll, AP's senior vice president and executive editor.

Carroll said in addition to personally speaking with photo editors, "I also know from 30 years of experience in this business that you can't get competitive journalists to participate in the kind of (staging) experience that is being described."

Nice try guys. Maybe next time.

I love saying that.

*UPPITY DATE: North clearly can't get over himself.

DUDE! You've been busted! Shut up already.

HEH-HEH: The Guardian's Roy Greenslade has more.

North refuses to accept the explanation, returning to the matter today with a stinging attack on AP. "The news agencies that stitched up the photos at the Qana site have all huddled together and got AP staff writer David Bauder to issue a story rebutting lil ol' EU Referendum." He offers no new insights, merely relying on a mixture of innuendo and sarcasm to heap scorn on the agencies, and also impugns Bauder's professional ethics.

I wouldn't have devoted all this space and attention to an unreasoned and disgraceful attack on photographers operating at risk to their lives in a war zone but for the fact that the "lil 'ol" website is gaining the attention of right-wing conspiracy theorists in the States (and possibly elsewhere). Any professional journalist knows that the pictures were not staged. The explanation about the time-stamping by AP is quite obviously true. North is wrong but his message is dangerous because it puts those photographers' lives in even greater danger. My advice to him is to stick to what he knows best by churning out anti-EU rants.

It's not just North refusing to accept the explanations. It's all the members of the Flogosphere who are grasping at straws, in deep denial over this atrocity.

They should be so brave to be out there risking their lives as bombs drop all around them.

THIS SAYS IT ALL:  It's from Daily Kos.

You'll look in vain for any admission at these sites that many innocents died a horrible death as a result of the bombings, the photographic evidence of which the wingers are pawing over, looking for any weakness. In this world view, death is an act of terrorism; it must be defeated, at any cost.

COMMENTS ON THIS THREAD HAVE BEEN CLOSED AS ISRAEL HAS APOLOGIZED AND ADMITTED RESPONSIBILITY FOR THIS ATROCITY.  SO MUCH FOR THE FLOGOSPHERE'S ATTEMPT TO MAKE THIS SEEM LIKE ANOTHER MEDIA CONSPIRACY.

Comments

[Arik]

Surely the website server would record when the pictures were posted, so it would be unnecessary to add that to the photo on the web page? And as Charles Johnson has already noted, the wire services can resolve the matter simply by releasing the actual timestamps from when the photos were taken, which are automatically recorded in the photos themselves by the digital camera.

"who did not actually visit the bombed building and were not present when the rescue took place"

No jounralists on site were permitted to visit the bombed building.

[Jay Currie]

Sorry Antonia, the jury is still out.

First, there are two distinct lines of argument being run. The first, and more speculative, is that the deaths at Qana were not caused by the Israelis directly but rather by Hezbollah explosives stored at or near the site. Or, in its strongest form, by Hez loading up the building with kids and blowing it up. these are matters of pure speculation and I doubt there is much chance of resolving them.

The second line is more difficult to dismiss. This position is that the Hezbollah media handlers (whom we all acknowedge exist) staged the photo-op and the MSM shooters at the scene played along.

This is a much more subtle argument and one which, if the press agencies involved wanted to, could be refuted in an instant. All they would need to do is release the full sets of the digital phtographs their people took at Qana with the time stamps made by the digital cameras themselves. That way a sequence could be established.

However, in the absence of such release, a press release from AP's well air conditioned VP is not going to cut it.

Finally, and you really have to wonder about this, what sort of people doing "rescue work" grab a dusty dead baby and hold it by its neck so our man Nasser Nasser can get the shot? And what sort of a person would do this again and again with more dead children?

Having a designated Hezbollah dead baby wrangler suggests a degree of cynicism and manipulation which renders any and all phtographs from Hezbollah controlled territory suspect.

[Pierre]

And once again the main casualty is the truth.

[Jay Currie]

Busted?? Antonia, EU Referendum is not only not busted but the fact the AP/Reuters folks cannot actually answer a single one of the questions he and various other bloggers have been raising suggests there is a great deal more to this story.

If AP and Reuters want to clear this up they need to release all the photos taken at Qana with the time stamps intact.

And, Antonia, Arik's point about no journalists being allowed near the bombed out building refutes your swipe at the bloggers and, more to the point, raises the basic question of why we should believe the dead baby wranglers' spin.

[sooey]

people still pay attention to rush limbaugh? cripes, what's he gotta do to be a laughing stock?

[Antonia Z.]

Jay,

First of all, your lack of sympathy disappounts me. "Dead baby wrangler?" How disgusting.

Second, North admits he was speculating. His ''gut instinct'' did not get him any closer to the bombed out building than the pro photogs got.

I am trying to imagine the shoe on the other foot here and how you would be howling if it were an Israeli house hit by a Hezbollah rocket and lefty bloggers were trying to cook up a conspiracy like this.

Give it a rest.

You lose.

I am not wasting my time on this anymore.

Show me the evidence.

[johnnykap]

Sooey, once again you show how ill informed you are. Rush Limbaugh is considered the most influential non-elected conservative in America. His show has the highest rating of any show in existence. Two weeks ago he had a private 20 minute meeting with Bush. About a month ago, he had dinner with Antonin Scalia. He's what you call a major player. He does a brilliant job of dissembling media bias. And he hammers you leftists relentlessly and he does it with humor and style. You probably haven't listened to 10 minutes of his radio show yet you know he's irrelevant.

AZ, you get disgusted far too easily. Especially by right wing commentary. I mean, come on. Dead baby wrangler is simply a descriptive term that gets the point across rather succintly. Is there a left wing politiclly correct way it should have been phrased?

[Arik]

Well, eureferendum's post today at http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2006/08/stretcher-alley.html comparing the iconic stills with video from the scene asks one simple question: why is there no video record of the activities shown in the stills? If Al-Jazeerah or any other network captured the events portrayed in the stills (obviously from different vantage point(s)), then they need simply air the video(s).

And the deliberate posing for photographers is also noted.

Btw, ever hear of the Jenin massacre that wasn't http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2165272.stm , the non-shooting of Mohamed Dura http://canadiancoalition.com/forum/messages/9758.shtml by the IDF, and the Palestinian beach not shelled http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/011800.php by the IDF?

[Antonia Z.]

It's showtime, Arik. Get out the popcorn.

http://today.reuters.com/tv/videoStory.aspx?isSummitStory=False&storyId=b54ddc65d448a7409f78e88402bce8c2b393a10b&WTmodLoc=NewsArt-L2-RelatedVideo-3

If you knew anything about anything, you would know that such disturbing pictures on video are NEVER released.

If I had time for your irrrelavnt fantasies, I would seek out more.

Your pal EU was nowehere near the place. Maybe somebody should drop him into Qana so he can see for himself. Yah., There;'s an idea.

Israel is not confirming his allegations. It denied the Jenin massacre.

Get over it.

[Arik]

You misunderstood the point, perhaps from not reading the Eureferendum link.

There is a specific sequence of stills images. Eureferendum shows the stretcher crew being videotaped, and that appears in the Reuters footage. However, there is no Reuters video footage, for example, of white t-shirt and Green Helmet, walking up an incline, as in this shot: http://www.eureferendum.com/admin/media/green%20helmet%20002.JPG

Nor of this shot: http://www.eureferendum.com/admin/media/stretcher%20sequence%2008.JPG

White t-shirt appears once in the Reuters footage, walking on a level area, 17-24 seconds into the footage. That is a different area from the iconic stills.

To avoid any further confusion, I will quote what Eureferendum asks:

quote

These shots were widely published – clearly their emotive impact was recognised by hundreds of editors. But nowhere do we see these graphic shots on video. Why not? Would filming have shown that the shots were staged?

unquote

I.e., multiple locations for effect, multiple passes for photographers, different times of the morning?

"If I had time for your irrrelavnt fantasies, I would seek out more.

Your pal EU was nowehere near the place. Maybe somebody should drop him into Qana so he can see for himself. Yah., There;'s an idea."

Apparent discrepancies concerning images exploited for political/strategic purposes are noted from a variety of sources, and questions formulated. It is unclear why such valid questions, on a media blog of all places, should be treated with such scorn and hostility.

[Jay Currie]

Antonia, no one - other than the poor child's parents - is sorrier to see a child killed no matter where. I can barely look at these phtographs without thinking that but for the Grace of God that could be my 2 year old.

Certainly not the, and I use the term advisedly, "dead baby wrangler" from Hezbollah who spent several hours holding the babies up for the phtographers.

I don't blame you for wanting to be rid of this: Hezbollah has been caught staging, milking as it were, the deaths of entirely innocent children. And your politics seem to prevent you from noting just how disgusting that is.

It is tragic that Hezbollah hides behind civilians therefore ensuring this sort of thing will happen; but it is a travesty that a supposedly "objective" media egged on by partisan critics such as yourself, would allow itself to be conned into uncritically covering the photo-ops Hezbollah provides.

You have already conceded that Hezbollah has control of the journalists in Lebanon. You have conceded that not one of the "journalists" at Qana were allowed near the building from which Green Helmet was bringing the babies. And you certainly cannot deny that Green helmet was posing the poor little children for Nasser Nasser and his cronies to shoot.

My position is that this was a tragedy turned into a photo-op and not one thing which you have written or quoted suggests that there is anything incorrect about this position.

The evidence, had you eyes to see it, is the disgusting use Hezbollah has made of the dead babies and the willingness of the MSM to cover it. That and the shiny, concrete dustless, blue pacifier hung from the poor little kids' clothes.

I think it is well past time for you to ask whether or not your political position has fatally compromised your capacity to actually cover the media story in Lebanon. If you can imagine that showing off dead children is somehow justified then you have pretty much lost it on this story.

[Arik]

"Israel is not confirming his allegations."

That's because the IDF is still investigating them and other questions concerning the incident. Which was noted in the JPost link I posted earlier today, and which you posted up front as well, *but without noting the IDF investigation* reported to be underway. Clearly, the *investigation* must precede any *confirmation* or non-confirmation.

[stephen.reeves]

More conspiracy noises,

http://mickhartley.typepad.com/blog/2006/08/stage_managed.html

"The Lebanese website LIBANOSCOPIE, associated with Christian elements in the country and which openly supports the anti-Syrian movement called the "March 14 Forces," reported that Hizbullah has masterminded a plan that would result in the killing of innocents in the Qana village, in a bid to foil Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's "Seven Points Plan", which calls for deployment of the Lebanese army in southern Lebanon and the disarming of Hizbullah.

"We have it from a credible source that Hizbullah, alarmed by Siniora's plan, has concocted an incident that would help thwart the negotiations. Knowing full well that Israel will not hesitate to bombard civilian targets, Hizbullah gunmen placed a rocket launcher on the roof in Qana and brought disabled children inside, in a bid to provoke a response by the Israeli Air Force. In this way, they were planning to take advantage of the death of innocents and curtail the negotiation initiative," the site stated.

The site's editors also claimed that not only did Hizbullah stage the event, but that it also chose Qana for a specific reason: "They used Qana because the village had already turned into a symbol for massacring innocent civilians, and so they set up 'Qana 2'." Notably, the incident has indeed been dubbed "The second Qana massacre" by the Arab media.

And in the comments a link to this French site, where it's pointed out that a disproportionate number of the children dragged from the collapsed building appear to be handicapped."

[Jay Currie]

Antonia,

Watched the Reuters clip....no sign of Green Helmet or the poor dusty child. It's video but it is not helpful in rebutting allegation that the dead baby shots were set up as photo-ops.

[Randall Isaacs]

Antonia: I have to say that it is rich for one who has flogged the whatreallyhappened.com and other wingnut web sites about 9/11 being perpetrated by someone other than the 19 hijackers and Al Qaeda ridiculing others who refuse to accept the "truth" from Hezbollah. We have already seen that Hezbollah is a pretty slick operation:

snip from CNN's Reliable Sources:

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Howard, there's no doubt about it: Hezbollah has a very, very sophisticated and slick media operations. In fact, beyond that, it has very, very good control over its areas in the south of Beirut. They deny journalists access into those areas. They can turn on and off access to hospitals in those areas. They have a lot of power and influence. You don't get in there without their permission.

And when I went we were given about 10 or 15 minutes, quite literally running through a number of neighborhoods that they directed and they took us to.

What I would say at that time was, it was very clear to me that the Hezbollah press official who took us on that guided tour -- and there were Hezbollah security officials around us at the time with walkie-talkie radios -- that he felt a great deal of anxiety about the situation. And they were telling him -- I just listened to an explosion going off there, coming from the southern suburbs. They were -- they were telling him -- a second explosion there. They were telling here -- rumbling on -- they were telling him get out of this area, and he was very, very anxious about it.

But there's no doubt about it. They had control of the situation. They designated the places that we went to, and we certainly didn't have time to go into the houses or lift up the rubble to see what was underneath.

So what we did see today in a similar excursion, and Hezbollah is now running a number of these every day, taking journalists into this area. They realize that this is a good way for them to get their message out, taking journalists on a regular basis. This particular press officer came across his press office today, what was left of it in the rubble. He pointed out business cards that he said were from his office that was a Hezbollah press office in that area.

Here's the link:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0607/23/rs.01.html

[Dave]

Here is a quote from a reporter that was actually on site;
"Now villagers in Qana tell them there are only five people that are unaccounted for, not the 25 or 30 they originally thought. The excavation teams give up the dig at about 7:30 p.m. Sunday. A beautiful soft dusk falls over the surrounding hills and valleys, a sharp contrast to the death and destruction they have been knee-deep in for more than 12 hours."

Which is he a "clown" or a "moonbat"?

For more go read Kevin Sites:
http://hotzone.yahoo.com/b/hotzone/blogs8012

[Antonia Z.]

SOME RESPONSES...

A. Thanks for the Kevin Sites link. He is one of the best reporters in the Middle East. For those of you who don't recall, Sites is the guy who caught that shooting in the Fallujah mosque in 2004/

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6496898/

B. Arik, investigation overr.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1154525793704

"The IDF on Thursday completed its inquiry into this week's incident in the Lebanese town of Kana, in which 28 Lebanese civilians were killed.

"The report, which was submitted to Defense Minister Amir Peretz, stated that intelligence indicated that the building hit in the deadly strike was not occupied by civilians, but was being used by Hizbullah."

Sound slike U.S. intelligence to me.

C. As for your comments Jay:

1. "You have conceded that not one of the "journalists" at Qana were allowed near the building from which Green Helmet was bringing the babies."

If you look at the video you can see the photographers and videographers doing their jobs right at the building, and beneath it.

2. "The evidence, had you eyes to see it, is the disgusting use Hezbollah has made of the dead babies and the willingness of the MSM to cover it."

Frankly, I, unlike you, am more disgusted by how the babies were killed in the first place.

I know you would prefer that the MSM not cover such stories. But I am not sure that those photos appeared in the MSM. Show me where they did.

3. " If you can imagine that showing off dead children is somehow justified then you have pretty much lost it on this story."

EXCUSE ME?

Show me where I justified that. Show me.

This is about one thing and one thing only: The Flogosphere's attempt to make this atrocity go away. So far you have no proof, none, that Israel did not kill these people.

Not even Israel denies it.

Are those photos in particular staged? Probably. But who cares? I haven't seen any of them in any mainstream media, so it's irrelevant. In fact, the only places I have seen them are on sites that are trying to discredit them. I imagine they're also in the Arab media but that's not pertinent here.

Again, your guy EU whatsisname tried to prove the tragedy was not caused by Israel. It was. End of story.

Don't make this about a few photos that nobody in the MSM used.

MOVE ON, guys.

[NPS]

"Dead baby wrangler is simply a descriptive term that gets the point across rather succinctly".

Jesus H Christ! is there not a shred of compassion for anything/anybody. Some of these people stoop to a level so low they are looking up at the floor.

[Randall Isaacs]

It is only fair that you give the whole story. I don't think anyone disputed that it was an Israeli bomb that hit the building. However, when Hezbollah fires rockets from buildings containing civilians, it is Hezbollah that puts the civilians at risk:

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/745828.html

[Antonia Z.]

Thank you for the link Randall.

All I can say is, if your children are ever taken hostage in an armed bank robbery and used as human shields by the bad guys, I hope the cops don't fire their guns right through them to get their man.

[Jay Currie]

There is an interview with the dead baby wrangler from al Jeezerah up at You Tube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyZsq3jyJ6w

I don't speak Arabic and so have no comment as to Green Helmet's remarks; but at 1:31 a "rescue team" with two photographers appears on the scene.At 1:40 they stop (and my read is they are cued) and lower the strecher. The photogs go in for the shot. About ten seconds later they pick the strecher back up and we see Green Helmet and a lot, and I do mean a lot, of media head towards the stretcher.

Photo-op? Staged? Take a look and decide for yourselves.

[Randall Isaacs]

Well Antonia, if the bank robbers were shooting at random so that the police had no other choice but to take the robbers out, I would be devastated for my children but understand that it was for the greater good. The only problems with this picture is the fact that the bank robbers are considered heroes by those whom they hide behind and it is only because of that fact that they are allowed to continue to rob banks.

[sooey]

there's simply no denying, however, that it's israel that kills them. the point being - if hezbollah is using civilians as human shields and israel is killing them anyway, then civilians aren't very good human shields - are they. which makes israel every bit as bad as hezbollah. keep looking for the good guys. you won't find them.

[Antonia Z.]

Jay, that was a rescue team either taking a break or giving the camera crews a clean shot. A photo opp, if you will.

So what?

That's a long way from saying Israeli bombs weren't responsible for the deaths, which is where this began.

And, since we have strayed so far off course, no thanks to you, I am closing the comments here.

Israel admitted responsibility for killing those kids.

No right wing wishful thinking will make it un-so.

[Jay Currie]

"Don't make this about a few photos that nobody in the MSM used".

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/31/world/middleeast/31scene.html?hp&ex=1154318400&en=8ff67d99b9d3fb3c&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Check the NYT slideshow at the left. Green Helmet is there.

The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1835152,00.html

I can't find the links but the poor child with the pacifier was, apparently, the front page picture on a number of MSM publications. MSM loved the pics.