Does it Take a Blogger to Discover It?


After Sakshitimes.com published the media fraud on Lebanon war, the bloggers continued to do their good works by exposing mainstream media. Major newspapers are silent on these. However, here are a few more exposes. Don’t miss it. This reminds us that we are not dealing with people who are biased but with liars.  By Jerry Thomas.

1.      The most serious one: The Red Cross Story- http://zombietime.com/fraud/ambulance/

2.      The Rocket Fraud: http://ussneverdock.blogspot.com/2006/08/lebanon-photogate-afp-joins-in.html  

3.      More on The Green Helmet Rescue Worker: http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2006/07/who-is-this-man.html

4.      A Detailed Exposure: http://www.aish.com/movies/PhotoFraud.asp

Earlier Story

When Reuters admitted that its’ photo showing plumes of smoke rising from Beirut following an IAF bombing was doctored, a few wondered whether it was a human error or an institutional bias. All photos of Adnan Hajj, freelance photographer who doctored photo, were withdrawn. By this time, it was already known that many other photos by Hajj were similarly doctored.

But this is not an isolated instance of faking even in the current war against Islam fascism in Lebanon.  On July 22nd Reuters published a photo of a woman standing in front of destroyed building reported  to be the photo after Israeli attacks on July 21st. Associated Press on August 5th published another photo which was again reported to be a photo from the August 4th Israeli attacks. Both these photos can be seen at  (http://drinkingfromhome.blogspot.com/2006/08/extreme-makeover-beirut-edition.html

 

Interestingly, in both these photos the woman who lost everything is the same!!!

 

Similarly another photo where a Lebanese ‘rescue worker’ holding a baby among debris is now alleged as doctored though denied by Associated Press.  Again, one must remember that it was only in this January that another photo published by the New York Times was found to be doctored (http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2006/01/14/international/worldspecial/14cnd-afghan.ready.html). One can also recollect the forged document presented against President Bush by Dan Rather in his famous CBS Sixty minutes or even the US solider supposedly raping an Afghan girl which was later found to be taken from a porn site.

These incidents have been occurring repeatedly. This raises the question: Why it is so?  Every time mainstream media calls this as a human error or an individual mistake that should not be used to discredit the media. But then, it poses some more questions.

1)     Why is that bloggers are able discover these as doctored in minutes after it is published and the mainstream media misses it? In all these cases, it is the bloggers who discovered these and not the mainstream media.  Are bloggers more competent or is there something more?

2)     Why these forged photos are all against Israel or other democratic countries like USA and not against Islamic nations. The mistake seems to have a disproportionate bias against democratic nations and for Islamic countries.

3)     How can someone take two photos of the same women in different places or of a fraud rescue worker unless it is staged? If it is staged (as it is becoming clearer now), then why should the media stream media align with the propaganda of Islamic nations?

These questions should probably lead us to the right answer.

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