It appears to have been Charles Johnson who came across in a discussion on Lightstalkers.org, a photography forum, of the testimony of a first-hand witness of an exceptionally revolting form of photo fraud.

–spellings as found–

i have been working in lebanon since all this started, and seeing the behavior of many of the lebanese wire service photographers has been a bit unsettling. while hajj has garnered a lot of attention for his doctoring of images digitally, whether guilty or not, i have been witness to the daily practice of directed shots, one case where a group of wire photogs were coreographing the unearthing of bodies, directing emergency workers here and there, asking them to position bodies just so, even remove bodies that have already been put in graves so that they can photograph them in peoples arms. these photographers have come away with powerful shots, that required no manipulation digitally, but instead, manipulation on a human level, and this itself is a bigger ethical problem.

by Bryan Denton Fri Aug 11 07:36:08 UTC 2006 | Beirut, Lebanon

Matthew Sheffield has compiled a nice collection of links to exposés of faked photojournalism from Lebanon.

Be sure to catch the German television news magazine Zapp’s video of Green Helmet guy acting as director.

Last month (7/19), we reported on Human Rights Watch’s protest over the use of ball bearings as shrapnel in Hezbollah’s rocket warheads.

Lenny Maschkowski, an ordinary Israeli, took a number of photographs in the vicinity of Haifa, and sent these images to Bert de Briun, a friend of his wife who blogs at Dutchblog Israel.

Mr. Maschkowski’s photos demonstrate very eloquently just how physically destructive are the attacks being conducted by Hezbollah upon Israeli civilians.

Thane Rosenbaum, in the Wall Street Journal, begins coming to his senses.

Many Jews are in my position — the children and grandchildren of labor leaders, socialists, pacifists, humanitarians, antiwar protestors — instinctively leaning left, rejecting war, unwilling to demonize, and insisting that violence only breeds more violence. Most of all we share the profound belief that killing, humiliation and the infliction of unnecessary pain are not Jewish attributes.

However, the world as we know it today — post-Holocaust, post-9/11, post-sanity — is not cooperating. Given the realities of the new Middle East, perhaps it is time for a reality check. For this reason, many Jewish liberals are surrendering to the mindset that there are no solutions other than to allow Israel to defend itself — with whatever means necessary. Unfortunately, the inevitability of Israel coincides with the inevitability of anti-Semitism.

This is what more politically conservative Jews and hardcore Zionists maintained from the outset. And it was this nightmare that the Jewish left always refused to imagine. So we lay awake at night, afraid to sleep. Surely the Arabs were tired, too. Surely they would want to improve their societies and educate their children rather than strap bombs on to them.

If the Palestinians didn’t want that for themselves, if building a nation was not their priority, then peace in exchange for territories was nothing but a pipe dream. It was all wish-fulfillment, morally and practically necessary, yet ultimately motivated by a weary Israeli society — the harsh reality of Arab animus, the spiritual toll that the occupation had taken on a Jewish state battered by negative world opinion.

The Jewish left is now in shambles. Peace Now advocates have lost their momentum, and, in some sense, their moral clarity. Opinion polls in Israel are showing near unanimous support for stronger incursions into Lebanon. And until kidnapped soldiers are returned and acts of terror curtailed, any further conversations about the future of the West Bank have been set aside.

Not unlike the deep divisions between the values of red- and blue-state America, world Jewry is being forced to reconsider all of its underlying assumptions about peace in the Middle East. The recent disastrous events in Lebanon and Gaza have inadvertently created a newly united Jewish consciousness — bringing right and left together into one deeply cynical red state.

Brave insurgent defending burning Lebanon against Israeli warplanes.

But, oops! he’s really posing in front of burning garbage at the local dump.

Thomas S., an Allahpundit reader catches US News falling for a faked photo.

Michelle Malkin covers this one, and another new one which appears to incorporate an underwear model as victim.

And be sure not to miss Michelle’s latest video on the Reuters photos: Picture Kill. It offers another excellent Malkin-special summary.

In a related inside look at the Chinese strategic viewpoint, Confidential Reporter posted on Sunday:

China Confidential has learned that Beijing remains confident that Hezbollah will prevail–politically, if not militarily–in the current conflict, strengthening Iran’s regional influence and prestige. People’s Liberation Army analysts contend that Hezbollah cannot be truly defeated and disarmed without World War II-style flattening of the 20 or more Lebanese villages in which Hezbollah hides and houses its Iranian-supplied missiles. An aerial bombardment of this magnitude would almost certainly result in massive civilian casualties–which increasingly isolated Israel can’t afford.

Therefore, PLA strategists are said to argue, Israel is restrained by sensitivity to world opinion from militarily crushing its enemy.

The analysis conforms with PLA theories of “unrestricted warfare,” including terrorism, information war, and “lawfare,” which in principle make it possible for smaller, technologically disadvantaged forces to fight–and defeat–great powers.

There is obviously a great deal of validity to the Chinese analysis.

Little Green Footballs publishes latest Adnan Hajj photo from Beirut (sent by reader humblegunner).

Rusty Shackleford debunks another Adnan Hajji modified photo. This plane may have been dropping bombs. The missiles are clearly an addition, but one bomb is too, so (in the end) there’s cause to wonder: were there any real bombs at all?

From Cox & Forkum.

This poor woman laments the destruction of her home in Southern Beirut by Israeli bombing, 22 July 2006. Reuters via Yahoo News.

And then, what do you know?

Here’s the same poor woman reacting to the destruction of her house in the suburbs of Beirut 05 August 2006. AP via Yahoo News.

Isn’t it an amazing coincidence?

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Hat tip to Drinking From Home who provides close-up facial photos, demonstrating the presence of the same mark and the same scar firmly establishing the identity of the woman in both photos as the same, and who observes mildly:

Either this woman is the unluckiest multiple home-owner in Beirut, or something isn’t quite right.

Scott Johnson at Powerline comes through with a link to a gallery of the work of the same photographer.

Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs has another scalp to hang on his barn door, next to Dan Rather’s.

Yesterday, LGF identified Photoshop-manipulated imagery in the Reuters’ photograph of alleged “burning buildings destroyed during an overnight Israeli air raid on Beirut’s suburbs August 5, 2006.”

Charles Johnson is an experienced photographer, and knowledgeable Photoshop user, and was readily able to recognize repetitive smoke patterns produced by application of the Photoshop clone tool.

Reuters has since admitted that LGF was right, and withdrawn the photo. Interestingly, Ynet.news reports that the photographer responsible was also the source of many of the photographs from Qana, also demonstrated by bloggers (specifically by EU Referendum) to have been staged.

Score two major Blogosphere corrections of the MSM falling for Hezbollah propaganda tricks in under a week.