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Rembember this ambulance that the media said Israel deliberately bombed?
Dan Riehl thought something didn’t look right and wrote a great post in which he argued that the ambulance couldn’t have been hit with a missile.
Now Zombietime picked up the ball and put together a fantastic piece which thoroughly debunks the “ambulance was bombed” lie that was spread all over the world by a willing media. Here’s part of Zombie’s introduction:
On the night of July 23, 2006, an Israeli aircraft intentionally fired missiles at and struck two Lebanese Red Cross ambulances performing rescue operations, causing huge explosions that injured everyone inside the vehicles. Or so says the global media, including Time magazine, the BBC, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and thousands of other outlets around the world. If true, the incident would have been an egregious and indefensible violation of the Geneva Convention, and would constitute a war crime committed by the state of Israel.
But there’s one problem: It never happened.
* * *
Of all the exposés and scandals surrounding the media’s coverage of the Israel-Hezbollah conflict in Lebanon, The Red Cross Ambulance Incident stands out as the most serious. The other exposés were spectacular in their simplicity (photographers staging scenes, clumsy attempts at Photoshopping images), but often concerned fairly trivial details. What does it matter whether there was a big cloud of smoke over Beirut, or a really big cloud of smoke, as one notorious doctored photograph showed? The fact that the media was lying was indeed extremely important, and justified the publicity surrounding the exposés — but what they were lying about was often minor, a slight fudging of the visuals to exaggerate the damage.
Read the whole thing. It’s long, but it’s worth the time.
Update: Check out Michelle Malkin‘s post on this topic. She not only has a great summary of Zombie’s post but also contact information for the media outlets that covered the fraudulent ambulance story.
The sad part is “I now know it was staged, you now know it was staged” BUT, (that’s a big O’l BUT) will the rest of the world especially the Arab world get this important tidbit of information?
Regrettably the answer is NO.
The definitive review in 2:35 or less, for my money, is Rusty Shackleford’s “All Your Fakes Are Belong To Us” at Michele Malkin’s post linked, about halfway down.
😉
The debunking of the antique MSM has gotten a little mention on FOX and now the crazies are bashing FOX for broadcasting the truth. Go figure.
I don’t think it’s BDS any longer. The lefties were lied to by the entire demoratic party for 40 years and then the Slick Willie administration put the icing on the cake by never telling one truth in 8 years. The lefties no longer know there is such a thing as ‘truth’.
Scrap: I never thought about it that way. Interesting.
They don’t think anyone tells the truth because it’s the norm in the Dem. Party.
True.
I think that a lot of people before today thought that the media lied.Now every one Knows,sadly they will continue on this same road,because it fits their world view
Now back to the topic of War Propaganda.
The U.S. perfected the use of mass media (by 1940’s standards) to distribute pictures and images of World War II that showed America in a favorable light and the enemy in an unfavorable light. The fact that the other side of this present day conflict is now trying to manipulate what we see should come as no surprise. Granted, they have a lot of catching up to do (some of these you can spot 10 miles away) but the fact that they are now getting savvy enough to try, should makes us use a more critical eye when viewing.
I personally don’t believe that media bashing moves the ball forward. Modern day media has become nothing more than a mirror to society. FOX,CNN,Drudge,Huffington are all trying to compete for your eyeballs. You have things that their advertisers want,..money. Whatever method they use to get your attention is fair game. It’s up to us to weed out the BS. That’s why sites like this are so important.
Yep! “Your T.V. is the battlefield!”, and these terrorist know how to use DECEPTION through the MEDIA. More on this in http://www.technonllc.com/blog
Maybe I’m an idiot but I never heard of an ambulance being bombed by anybody. What the hell story are we trying to debunk? Did this story actually happen are are we debunking a story that never existed in the first place?
And oh yeah, damn them evil Democrats for lying about Iraq having WMDs and ties to 9/11 and ties to Al Qaeda and imminent threats and……………….oops! My bad! Dems just lied about a blow job. Sorry. Well…..at least the blow job had an exit strategy…excuse me, I mean stratergy.
God, I am so damned tired about hearing the “there were no WMDs in Iraq!” line of BS.
Can somebody please stop the madness?
And can Syntax stay on topic?
Tune in next time, folks!
Careful there . . . he suffers from Acute Cognitive Disorder, or ACt Duh. It’s a violation of federal law to make fun of him.
Please note Wizbang! assumes no responsibility whatever if you allow him to drool on your person. Please re-read your Terms of Service, and make sure your tetanus and rabies shots are up-to-date.
Hmmm.
I can’t remember exactly where but I’m certain I’ve seen these same ambulances used in news stories from either Gaza or the West Bank.
Why are we talking about it? I remember seeing it in the paper and on the news. Maybe you would too if you would pay attention. And, hey, if you did you might see some stuff like this:
(“damn them evil Democrats for lying about Iraq having WMDs and ties to 9/11 and ties to Al Qaeda and imminent threats”)
You know, like:
“He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983.”
Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998
“One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line.”
President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998
“We urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S.Constitution and Laws, to take necessary actions, (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq’s refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs.”
Letter to President Clinton, signed by Sens. Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, and others Oct. 9, 1998
“Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process.”
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998
“We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandated of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them.”
Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002
“We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country.”
Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002
“We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction.”
Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002
“The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities.
Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons…”
Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002
“In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons.”
Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002
SEN. ROCKEFELLER-D (October 10, 2002): “I do believe that Iraq poses an imminent threat, but I also believe that after September 11th, that question is increasingly outdated.”
So, tell us…does it hurt to be so very full of crap? Catch up, you’re such a 2004 troll. For the hard-of-reading you’ll note that these quotes, a mere sampling, start well before Bush ever began running for President, let along ‘lying’ about anything.
Falze,
Oh my God! Politicians lie to us. Even Democrats, who would have been able to see that one coming. Please, we’re now in low hanging fruit territory. Like my Grandpa used to say: How can you tell if a politician is lying?. His lips are moving. Please don’t let this thread turn into a your side lies worse than my side does argument. We all lose on that one.
Your side lies worse than my side most certainly is pointless but I think that the list of dems “lying” about WMD was in response to this…
“…….oops! My bad! Dems just lied about a blow job.”
Which was an *incredibly* stupid statement.
I’m with SilverBubble… I’m sick of hearing about it. The fact is Saddam wanted WMDs was working on getting WMDs and had proved willing to use WMDs against his own people in the past. There was no reason short of insane denial to doubt that he’d willingly use them again or supply terrorist groups with WMDs if given a chance. Nothing he did was ever in good faith. That he turned out, as far as we’ve been able to tell, not to have succeeded as much as the intel suggested (and possibly even as much as Saddam himself believed), does not change any of that.
Why not whine about something original like “it’s the oil.” (That might actually get somewhere, because as we all know, Saddam was a poopy head who refused to sell it.)
Live@9
The funny thing about those old propaganda films was that everyone knew they were propaganda films. The US did them, so did the Nazis, the Japanese, the Russians, etc. If you go back and watch them it was obvious what they were. There was even a sort of code used that let you know what you were seeing: lots of marshal music, bugles, and flags waving. Regular news got a whole different set-up. The similarities of the style of film were amazingly similar no matter what side you were on. Today’s Israeli and Hezbo films are little different.
What IS different today is that supposedly neutral third parties are depicting this stuff in the same matter of fact way as they would show a fire at the Dairy Queen, when much of it is staged, reworked, or an outright lie. Move the ball forward? I am not sure why that even applies. I expect “professional journalists”, if there is such a thing, to behave that way. Do we let crooked politicians off the hook when they are caught doing something that would get me 3-5 in a federal penitentiary, just because ‘they are all crooks anyway’?
I say if we catch them then bash them well. Hold their feet to the fire. If you wish to stand back and chortle in some omniscient sort of critique, then go ahead. The folks doing the Fisking are doing us all a favor. Maybe the MSM will get the message and at least go back to playing the music and waving the flags so it’s obvious which side they are on.
Yeah…right….same old yada yada yada….
Ambulance story? Still can’t find it.