New Ambulance Images May Support Journo’s Claim
New images and some older video appear to support at least one defense of The Age in the on going Lebanese Red Cross ambulance story. Though certainly nothing can excuse the otherwise sloppy reporting that went on around a, by definition, International incident.
The Age continues to defend reports of an Israeli air strike on two ambulances in Lebanon, suggesting Zombie Time was analyzing images of the wrong ambulance.
The Age visited the yard where the bombed out ambulances are now parked. This reporter saw the ambulance that Mr Fawaz was in. It appeared to have been hit by a weapon that punctured a huge hole through the back. The zombietime.com only shows the picture of the second ambulance that had a smaller puncture through the top where there was a pre-existing vent in the centre of the vehicle.
Meanwhile, Andrew Bolt continues to challenge The Age on their coverage.
Ambulance attack evidence stands the test
It does? But read on and you will find that reporter Sarah Smiles, who lived as a student in Beirut for four years, doesn’t confirm the evidence but change it:
• The missile through the Red Cross painted on the roof of one ambulance becomes a possible missile through the back of the other of the two that were attacked.
Images of both ambulances do exist and I’ve edited a section of video, playing it back below at half speed to show the two ambulances together. In all honesty, I had set out to debunk claims by The Age that the photos we’ve been looking at were the wrong ones; however, careful analysis appears to depict what looks like a hit from something on a second ambulance and the location of it does line up with other basic elements of the story.
This isn’t to say that I don’t have concerns over the coverage of this incident, taking, at most, what was likely an inadvertent hit, or a strike at an ambulance being co-opted for battle and turning it into a story suggesting Israel was deliberately targeting ambulances.
But I can only go with the evidence I turn up and be as honest as I can be about it. This new evidence suggests the strike in question very well may have been against the second ambulance. I’ve used a red arrow in a still frame image form the video to show what looks like the signs of such a strike.
You’ll see pushed up metal and an apparent hole over where the gurney Ahmed Fawaz is reported to have been lying upon when the strike occurred. The red in the foreground is from the top of the vehicle we’ve all been looking at so closely.
At the end of the video below and also captured in a small image is another issue. It looks as if the glass was stripped from this vehicle while it sat on the road in a location other then where it was allegedly struck.
As I reported here, the earliest known image of one of the ambulances appears to place it near a construction site, possibly in Qana. And there is at least reason to question if these ambulances, like others, may have been involved in some type of war related activity.
The vehicles have moved multiple times and the story became news long before professional journalists had any access to the vehicles at all. Given Hezbollah’s well-known reputation for playing the press for advantage, we all need to be watchful when reports such as this one emerge.
Obviously there is still reason for concern over the sloppy and conflicting reports around this incident, which Tim Blair continues to document. His latest here. Lgf has placed its significant archive of the story and other Fauxtography issues here.
As the very short video below is at 50% speed, the audio is obviously distorted. The first 17 seconds of the video are silent.
I suppose the construction site is near to the red cross station
see the dahr jamail site:
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/gallery/view_album.php?set_albumName=Lebanon_Red_Cross_Ambulance_Target_Israel_Air_Strike
On the hole in 777.
Note from the video that 777 seems to be undamaged except the hole:
http://www.eureferendum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2375&start=90
http://dogfightatbankstown.typepad.com/blog/2006/09/on_31_august_ch.html
Bill’s Bites
The webmaster’s blog-within-a-blog. Continuously updated, newest items at the top. 17:22Journalists Change Story, Attempt ComebackJohn Hinderaker The story of the alleged Israeli missile or rocket attack on two Red Cross ambulances was one of Hezbollah…
Nothing has changed. Both ambulances were left on the road and allowed to be stripped and raped. The damage was done by hoodlams with axes and hammers. They knocked out the roof vents while standing on the roof. They took out all the glass. The damage to these ambulances only occurred at the location they were being filmed at. There is no evidence on the video to show a “rear” entry missle. Even if there was such evidence like the missle-through-roof evidence, then there is the matter of the still missing explosive evidence and the remains of the missle. Once again, these ambulances were left in an area and were junked. ONly during that lates skurmish with Isreal were they pulled out and paraded in front of the camera.
What is bogus is that you give the terrorists the benefit of the doubt.
Dan jumped the sha-ark, Dan jumped the sha-ark, Dan jumped the sha-ark!
Puh-leaze. Get a grip.
The entire story is 104% bogus.
Dan jumped the sha-ark, Dan jumped the sha-ark, Dan jumped the sha-ark!
Puh-leaze. Get a grip.
The entire story is 104% bogus.
Looks to me like it’s time to visit the junkyard, find a van/ambulance more-or-less like the ones in the video and fire a missle-equivalent into the sucker. I’m willing to be it does a lot more damage to the interior than either one of those in the video shows. Heck, I saw an amublance once (when I was working as a volunteer EMT) that was rolled at 45MPH and had way more interior damage than either one of those seems to have.
What is bogus
LMAO You have an entire scenario worked out with nothing to back it up, and all I did was point out there’s indeed a hole in a second ambulance – and I’m “bogus.” Obviously there’s enough kool aid to go round on both sides of the issue. I don’t give anyone the benefit of any doubt, I just look at what’s there.
Have any of you Einstein’s asked yourself if Israel was interested in saying this never happened, they’d release combat video? That’s what they did when accused of striking the house in Qana. I don’t doubt it wasn’t a “missile.” Hell it might have been sharpnel, might have been an ax. But unless or until I can prove something, I don’t fool myself into thinking it’s absolutely true.
What is bogus is that you give the terrorists the benefit of the doubt.
Posted by: captainfish | Sunday, September 03, 2006 at 07:05 PM
Did I miss something?
It’s OK Dan. We all make mistakes. I admit to my share. Admit to yours.
Almost no news out of the ME has any creditability whatsoever.
Rippley: “Let’s nuke them from orbit… just to be sure.”
/Aliens
Amen
So did the evil Israelies hunt down and target the only two ambulances still operating in Lebanon with Type 2 Plates?
OOPS!
No way.
“The zombietime.com only shows the picture of the second ambulance that had a smaller puncture through the top where there was a pre-existing vent in the centre of the vehicle”
You don’t get “smaller punctures” from weapons fired from air platforms, and rarely do they go through “pre-existing” holes.
This is “oh crap, let’s cover our tracks.”
SOme of you folks really need to get a life. By confirming one simple aspect of the report, I am not suggesting we have all the answers, or not what caused the damage. What’s frightening is how many on any side of an issue are willing to assume they have all the answers, when they clearly don’t.
In the end, I am not on a side when it comes to relaying information and observations. I simply acknowledge what is there. That some of you are incapable of doing that only suggests you’re precisely what it is you criticize in a media that is obviously biased. Two wrongs do not make a right when attempting to get to the truth.
let’s cover our tracks
The problem with that theory is that this appears to be the Kevin Sites video which was one of the first records made. It could be bogus as to what made any damage, but it was not produced post controversy.
Dan, the fact is that the pictures you posted are not good enough for any analysis at all. In fact, the picture with the red arrow may or may not show an ambulance. The fact is, the only high resolution pictures we have seen so far show – as conclusively as the faked TANG memos – that the original reports were untrue. If The Age reporter actually visited the 2nd ambulance, and there is conclusive evidence that ambulance number 2 was hit by a missile, I would expect a high resolution picture to be presented, not something that appears to be taken by a cell phone camera at 100 yards.
There are plenty of pictures of cars and trucks that have been hit by bombs and missiles. These are nothing like those pictures. An open mind is one thing. Credulity is another.
You say you can discern some unphotographed damage in this video. I can’t – it’s a jerky hand-held shot that only shows the possible damage from a distance. It would be so, so easy for the Lebanese to prove the truth of their story. All they would need is a photograph of the damage which is consistent with the other shots. Instead we get these constantly changing stories, photos of things that we *know* aren’t missile damage, and nobody doing the easy and obvious things to prove the assertions, even though there are literally hundreds of newspapers that reprinted them.
I think most people can guess why we don’t get to see clear photos of the alleged damage: because the ambulances were not hit by missiles and they don’t even *look* like they were hit by missiles. I predict that we will soon be told that the ambulances have been destroyed, making it impossible to check the truth of the story. At some stage more photos will be released showing other damage. The new photos will be inconsistent with the earlier ones, but by that time nobody will care.
It would be so, so easy for the Lebanese to prove the truth of their story.
I don’t disagree. But as I pointed out, the Israelis have yet to release a battle field video either, as they did in Qana. I’d like to see both sides do just that. But Israel hasn’t challenged the report, bloggers have.
Dan,
I don’t understand this point you’re making about the Israelis providing “battlefield video”. I can see how they might have video proving they’d shot at the ambulance. What video is going to show they *didn’t*? It’s not as if they have cameras tracking every vehicle on the road, from the moment they leave the parking lot to the moment they return…
Any slightly intelligent person, who has seen any vehicle damaged in a road accident where bare metal is visible, would immediately realize that the amount of rust appearing in any of the pictures of the ambulances is not the result of a recent damage. This FACT alone is sufficient to prove the non-veracity of the claims concerning these ambulances.
Dan,
Nonetheless, I do see what you’re talking about in the other ambulance–what seems to be a hole in the roof toward the back.
Have you noticed that there’s no red cross on top of that one? not that I can see, anyway. Do you suppose that might be why we aren’t treated to a photo of the hole? Supposing the Israelis had targeted the ambulance, it might easily be that they had mistaken it for any white van. Hence the fake targeted ambulance, which would have been clearly visible from above: it is brought into the story to make the Israelis guilty of a war crime, and to be sure no one knows the Lebanese Red Cross is guilty of gross negligence. Why, after all, were they supposedly transfering patients from one ambulance to another? I can imagine one reason: if an honest observer had noticed that the one ambulance had no red cross on top, the accusers could have pointed to the other, which does, and the scenario, which they could claim should have been apparent from above.
If the Israeli’s hit any ambulance, they did not do it intentionally, and the accident was the Red Cross’s fault, which they’ve tried to hide with this strained scenario and blatant falsification of evidence. That’s what I see, so far.
I’m with clazy – how can you say “Israel was interested in saying this never happened, they’d release combat video? ” … how can they have a video of them not shooting up the vans if they didn’t shoot-up the vans in the first place??
For my mind, the fact that there are no high-resolution pics of the shot-up ambulances is proof enough that this incident is a classic Hezbulla furfy, and Israel-bashers simply regurgitated the crap as ordered.
@Luc:
“Any slightly intelligent person, who has seen any vehicle damaged in a road accident where bare metal is visible, would immediately realize that the amount of rust appearing in any of the pictures of the ambulances is not the result of a recent damage. This FACT alone is sufficient to prove the non-veracity of the claims concerning these ambulances.”
How do you know what happens to steel when a heat producing missile hits it? I suppose you don’t.
@Dan:
The picture you presented shows that 777 has a hole in its roof, appearently right in the center. But if you are refering to the video as evidence for that then you should note that one can see from the video that 777 shows in no way the damage of a vehicle hit by a missile. By carefully disecting the video one can see that.
Tim Blair has a new photo that shows another ambulance with a hole in its roof:
http://timblair.net/ee/index.php/weblog/missile_story_x/
Harris: I don’t pretend to know what happens to steel when a heat producing missile hits it, but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t look like that. Furthermore, why wouldn’t this heat burn the rest of the ambulance? And where’s the hole in the ambulance’s floor? And where’s the missile, or its remains? And why are there so many conflicting stories, each one conveniently arriving to patch up the holes introduced by the last one?
@Joe
That was just an arguement against “sufficient FACTS”, which are not.
–
THE YOUTUBE VIDEO WAS MADE PRIVATE!!
It was certainly convenient that they had Opened both tailgates B4 the missles hit them, wasn’t it.
This whole scenario is so much like the car that Guiliana Sgrena was reportedly traveling when “hundreds of bullets” riddled the car. When the car is finally produced we see a handful of bullet holes. Then we get shouts of, “That’s not the car! It was another car!”
Dan I read your blog a lot and I respect you, but I personally see no evidence of anything through the photos and video footage supplied to imply or substantiate claims of the “other” ambulance being the one which suffered missile damage.
Like you, I think simple facts far outweigh any nuance, gray areas or flowery language. But I’m sorry, I cannot discern at all, either way, what happened to the other ambulance. Perhaps you see clearly what many of us cannot, and I think a few others here have wrongly attacked you, but I just don’t see it myself. Shouldn’t Sarah Smiles, as a trained journalist, have produced some photographic evidence – anything at all – to substantiate her claims? Instead, all we have is jerky and grainy footage that no one else can seem to make anything of. There is a plethora of photographic evidence (clear and precise photos) of the hole-in-the-middle-of-the-cross ambulance, yet conspicuously absent is any clear evidence of the one which is being focused on now. And personally, I find that suspicious in itself.
Respectfully,
Oyster
Regardless of anything anyone else has written, I can state with no doubt whatsoever that missiles do not just “punch holes” in unarmored vehicles, because I’ve seen many vehicles on practice ranges, and not a few in the Iraqi desert just across the Saudi border back in the day, which were hit by missiles or other similar sized projectiles. Modern ordnance does not leave them unburned or unmangled, and rarely do they even leave them recognizable as anything but scrap. Something as small as a LAW rocket or RPG, with a warhead of only a kilo or so, would have shredded an ambulance, but an aircraft-fired Air-to-Ground missile such as a Hellfire or Maverick, which were designed to destroy tanks, would have left nothing but burned-out wreckage. What happened to these ambulances was nothing more than vandalism by the paleos who are nothing but backward, unevolved, subhuman savages.
If the Israelis didn’t attack the ambulances, no record of the attack can exist.
I have discovered a film which shows the IDF not attacking an ambulance. I hope this satisfies the people who demanded video evidence.
Debunking the Dubunking of the Debunking
All right, let’s see if we can follow the machinations of the Lebanese ambulance attack hoax of 2006… Bunkum — On July 23rd, during the late war between Israel and Hezbollah, the latter claimed that the perfidious Jews deliberately shot…
Guys don’t fall to their trap. Hizballah, al-Qaeda and other terrorists use DECEPTION through the media and they are pretty good at it! Don’t buy into their DECEPTION PR. Reuters, the NYTimes, CNN already have and only to try and do damage mitigation one week after. It’s too late. Once you air it for the first time without having checked and double-checked your sources…IT’S TOO LATE! For more on terrorism and the use of media check out “The Terrorist’s Nightmare” blog at http://www.TechnonLLC.com/blog
Dan, I’m not sure what you mean by “Have any of you Einstein’s asked yourself if Israel was interested in saying this never happened, they’d release combat video?” This seems to assume that a) Israel did, in fact, target these amublances to begin with and thus would have footage of doing so, b) that they take ground footage of every second their planes are in the air c)that they take footage of every car on the road in Lebanon at all times–whether they have an aircraft in the area or not…and d) that, assuming they did attack and did get video footage, they are going to put the manpower into finding and retrieving from the hundreds of hours of video that they do have footage of this event which caused no loss of life.
The absolute worse assumption made here is that the people in the military who handle refuting things are even aware that this is an issue in the outside world and that maybe they should think about doing something about it. The second worse assumption along this line of thinking is that someone would actually get off their duff and do something about it. I am friends with someone who is quite high up in the media relations department for the airforce and she only knew anyone was talking about this after reading a YNET article about the zombietime report. As she noted, they are almost entirely focused on media relations within Israel (e.g. talking to the Israeli public about issues that relate to them) and trying to present the “human” side of the air force to foreign journalists (who aren’t interested in that kind of thing anyway). Israelis are not good with what we can “hasbara” (presenting ourselves to the outside world, clarifying things and so forth) and you have to live here to understand the absolute, incredible degrees of incompetence
Posted by: harris | Monday, September 04, 2006 at 05:15 AM
“How do you know what happens to steel when a heat producing missile hits it? I suppose you don’t.”
I have to admit that I have not seen a piece of steel hit by a heat producing missile but I have seen steel heated to “red hot” conditions for the purpose of welding. I have also seen steel subjected to the higher temperatures of electric welding. In either case the piece of steel did not rust instantly. It stands to reason that if steel were to rust so quickly repairing car bodies damaged in accidents would be a nearly impossible task. From my personal experience and judging by the large number of “body shops” damaged car bodies are easily repaired.
Another question, about the possibility of heat producing missile hitting the car, occurs to me that why is not the ambulance burned?
Dan, I’m not sure what you mean by “Have any of you
I’m not suggesting Israel deliberately targeted ambulances. What I said is that, immediately after Qana they released targeting video and video of rockets being fired from near the location hit. Battlefield video, especially involving air attacks is routinely taken. Somewhere there is likely film taken from above of what went on.
The ambulance wars get hotter
Tenacious bloggers are not letting the MSM off the hook for the dubious Qana ambulance incident this summer. Zombie has an update with responses to various media attempts to debunk the debunking. The Herald Sun’s Andrew Bolt shreds a report…
Qana must have been hit a bunch of times, but I’ve only seen a handful of brief movies shot by the IDF. Even assuming that they always use video equipment that is capable of recording, they probably wouldn’t archive everything. In this case especially, you’re asking for video of them *not doing something*. Can you see the logical problem in that? Why do you assume that they were anywhere near these ambulances?
Here’s a possible scenario that explains the ambulancies and the conflicting stories.
The driver reacts to a perceived explosion by veering off the road, further damaging an already-damaged ambulance and injuring the passengers. The driver believes he was attacked (not hit) by an Israeli helicopter firing missiles.
Here’s the origin of the story: “These people were hurt when their ambulance was attacked by an Israeli helicopter!”
The ambulance is transferred to a junk yard. Someone thinks “Cool! A vent!” and souvenirs the dome from the ambulance’s roof.
Reporters hear about the ambulance attacked by Israelis and they get demand to see the ambulance. They see the hole where the dome was. “Wow! Was that hole made by a missile?” The guy showing them around says, “Uh, I guess.”
Second iteration: “This ambulance was hit by an Israeli missile, which made a hole in the roof.”
The reporters want to know who got hurt when the ambulance was struck by the missile that made a hole in the roof. “Well, here’s the driver – he got bruises and a cut chin.” The reporters are disappointed, so the hospital director takes them to some other guys and says “Look at these victims of Israeli brutality! This guy has lost a leg, and his son has a brain injury!”
Third iteration: “A man lost a leg and his son was brain damaged when the ambulance they were travelling was attacked by an Israeli helicopter that blasted a hole in its roof.”
And so the story continues to develop. Nobody was really lying, they were just excited and it got out of hand. Now they’re committed to the story and they feel they *have* to lie.
All these scenarios of what could have happened, why there’s no film of what could have happened. What if NOTHING happened?