snapped shot

I'm sorry, but there really is absolutely no excuse for photos like this. It's an AFP photo, so the link should stay good forever, but just in case, it's also archived here.

Seriously: What "news" does this convey? How does this serve the average newsreader?

As Gateway Pundit has pointed out earlier, Essam al-Sudani is actively involved with the Mahdi Army, but the picture above is well beyond all reasonable limits of news gathering, and has clearly moved into the realm of actively assisting a terrorist group.

If I were a news customer, I would demand that the AFP immediately cease all association with Mr. al-Sudani, and that they remove all of his terrorist propaganda from their archives.

Jan-Edward has more thoughts on this. Via Google Translate, he asks:

There has been in recent months and years been much discussion about whether or not to use as a (photo) journalist embedded with a military unit to work.

That is the question arises: Are there also photographers "embedded" with the other warring parties? (For words like 'rebels',' freedom 'and' terrorists' but even aside to let).

Today I ask this question but again on the agenda, following photos AFP photographer Essam al-Sudani through his press office has published.

Those photos show that Essam al-Sudani zastane Sjiitische with fighters of the Mahdi militia in Basra, for example, he photographs at the time it places a roadside bomb. I still get an uneasy feeling in these and other photographs of the said AFP photographer.

I'm glad I am not the only one thinking this.

One man, three wire agencies. (Reuters even cropped the photo for maximum "impact." Whatever that means. Who knows? Maybe they were just trying to take a known terrorist out of the background... )

Seriously, this stuff never gets old for me.

Bonus: The facial expression in this picture? Priceless.

Be sure to click the links, while you still can. Continue reading »

It looks like Pakistan is doing its best to prove that it is the world's Jihad superstar. I don't have much time for commentary on this little shin-dig, other than to point out that yes, these people flowed out of their mosque after Friday prayers, with hatred in their eyes, and fire in their hands.

Stay classy, Pakistan!



But... but... I thought "a holy war" meant that they wanted to lower their calorie intake! Isn't that what CAIR keeps telling us?

Bonus: Looks like the "Death to Wikipedia" crowd will be pleased by this one.



I'll do my best to keep an eye open for other Denmark Days... of RAGE around the world. If you see something on the wires before I do, just poke me and let me know about it. Until later, feel free to peruse the ragerific rage there is—All neatly catalogued beyond the fold.

Greetings, fellow Malkin fans! This is becoming a regular season of rage, isn't it?

Update: Syria says that the Danish cartoons will lead to "religious war." Cool beans—Let me know when the crusade kicks off. Continue reading »

... from the Religion of Peace:



Robert Spencer has the intellectual details over here. This not being a very intellectual blog, all I've got to share with you is more pictures of burnin' stuff, right beyond the fold!

See-also: Atlas Shrugs, Michelle Malkin, Ace o' Spades, Geenstijl, dogfight at bankstown, doubleplusundead, Nihil Obstat, Atheist Media Blog, Nice Deb.

What the? Robert Spencer refers to me by name now? If anyone needs me, you'll have to pick me up offa the floor...

Dare I say— is it time to kick off the Photoshop Contest? Continue reading »

The Associated Press does us proud yet again, bringing us the first-hand report of people who want to indiscriminately kill civilians:



For more background on these type of antics, start reading here.

As an aside, I'm trying to track down some information about AP photos that were reportedly taken at the Hamas school-slash-rocket launching ground from last week that Soccer Dad has alerted me to. I hope to have more on that shortly.

Jack Williams asks, I deliver. Though it seems that this is a picture from before the first one:



As the esteemed Lawhawk [blog] points out, Agence France-Presse was on-site for this Hamas photo-op as well. Here's a sample for ya—



Here's a question for ya, while I'm busy rounding up photos:—If the IDF were to decide to counter-attack this enemy mortar position, either with a jet or a tank round, the photographers in situ would almost certainly be killed. Were that to have happened, what do you suppose the odds are that the usual suspects would be weeping and gnashing their teeth over Israel's war crimes?

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.

I'm not sure if this was caused by a problem on Louai Beshara's camera, some kind of network issue he encountered while uploading it to the wire services, or Yahoo!'s legendary stability, but the result is pretty funny nonetheless. And besides, it's not like one can really tell the difference between all the ragin' these days.