TYRE, Lebanon - After hours of digging in the blistering heat, Salam Daher emerged from the wreckage with the body of a 9-month-old baby, a blue pacifier still pinned to its nightshirt.He held the infant up and, click, an Associated Press photographer snapped another picture of Daher, in his trademark green helmet, displaying a civilian victim of Israeli bombs for the world to see.
Daher, a member of the civil defense for 20 years, has been photographed with bodies of the dead in two wars now — first in 1996 and most recently with the baby on July 30 __ both times after Israeli attacks in the village of Qana six miles southeast of the city.
For that reason, some Web sites have labeled him the "Green Helmet," and accused him of being a member of the Hezbollah guerrilla group, and of showing off bodies as propaganda.
"But that isn't true," he told The Associated Press. He is not affiliated with any party, he said. "I am just a civil defense worker. I have done this job all my life."
Hours of digging in the blistering heat, eh? Well let's take a look at what Mr. Daher looked like after those long hours of digging through dusty rubble:
Look at his clothes. Does that look like a man who has been digging through the dusty rubble of a collapsed building for "hours?" Sure doesn't look like it to me.
This guy's a fraud, and media organizations like the Associated Press are complicit in perpetuating his fraud and disseminating his pro-Hezbollah propaganda.
The media prides itself on, according to them, wading through layers baloney to get to the truth of a matter. Journalists routinely use leaked government secrets and skeptical reporting to dig deep into what our political leaders are doing. Sometimes that's justified, sometimes it isn't, but either way the techniques journalists apply to the President of the United States, for instance, stand in stark contrast to the way they treat an alleged "civil defense worker" who is accused based on some pretty good evidence of being a propagandist for terrorists.
Green helmet feeds the Associated Press a story, and they're all too happy to swallow it (while admonishing his critics) no questions asked.
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Comments: 8
have you heard the story that there was recycling of bodies? it seems that the count of the dead went up mysteriously..
people that truly care should ask themselves why anyone would place children next to rocket launching pads but since people are too busy with the photos few ask the right questions, even the UN is biting on the warm dangeled by the hizballah..
as usual good posting Rob!
Of course, those images of FDNY men carrying folks out of the WTC were probably just staged propaganda shots.
Please...put down your attitude for a moment and consider that people who are UN workers or emergency workers in southern Lebanon might just be there for something approaching the reasons that they're supposed to be there for.
If someone made this accusation about our first responders, you'd be horribly offended. I'm sorry to make the parallelism, but I feel you are not thinking about what you are assuming.
It's far more likely that the AP reporter was exaggerating about the chief of civil defense doing the digging for hours. Anyone on this scene with emergency response and medical training would have been doing triage and caring for those still breathing, or directing rescue efforts.
Multiple media people were there. They are not idiots. They are reporters stationed in a war zone. Even the reporters embedded with our troops know when they're being "fed." None of the reporters or aid workers on site thought there was anything being staged.
An article about whether a reporters photo was staged and you have people attacking political parties.
Propaganda is a powerful tool if done well, and they are good at it.
There's blame enough to go around on both sides. "Fighting for Peace" whether conducted by Hezbollah or the Israeli Defence Forces is war and war equals death, destruction and carnage committed by both sides.
If Israel really wants Peace, then it should tear down that border wall they have built. I hope that the Israeli people will vote in leaders willing to pursue a real peace as actively as their past and current leaders have pursued war.
The same for the Palestinians, though I believe it less likely - mostly due to the fact that the Palestinians are not as well educated, cannot - by virtue of their very culture - vote for much, and are led by both leaders and a faith that seems to demand war, not peace.
Israel has always had the upper hand in Palestine - especially after it became a recognised State - this fact is even more true now than it was then - both as a culture and as a military entity.