Hezbollah released a video today that they say refutes the IDF aerial footage released two days ago.
Here’s the IDF footage taken shortly after the nighttime explosion:
It’s damning because they are removing the incriminating evidence of their violations of the cease-fire agreement before they let the UNIFIL forces in to inspect.
Here’s the Hizbullah footage.
There are several gaping holes with this argument.
1. The Hizbullah video was shot in broad daylight, whereas the IDF footage was taken at night, shortly after the blast occurred.
2. The position of the truck in the Hizbullah version and the IDF video are not the same. In the Hizbullah version the truck is backed up directly to the loading dock and there are two men shoving the debris into the back of the truck. In the IDF footage, the truck is parked a little bit away and there are at least 5 men carefully carrying the disputed object and loading it onto the truck.
3. In order for the Hizbullah video to disprove the IDF footage, their video has to be of the same event, which is impossible given points 1 and 2.
4. If it is not of the same event, and the Hizbullah video was shot the next day, then that does not disprove anything, since they could have shown up, and started clearing debris while filming themselves. This would also account for the presence of the Lebanese Military and UNIFIL forces since Hezbollah gave them access to the explosion site several hours after the explosion, after they had removed various items.
5. The IDF video shot shortly after the explosion shows Hezbollah cordoning off the area, loading items which could be a missile onto a truck and then driving the trucks 4km away to a known Hizbullah arms depot in another village. After they were done clearing the house, they let UNIFIl and the Lebanese Military enter the area.
The most obvious question that comes to mind is: “Who do they think they’re kidding. Do they take us for imbeciles?”
Here’s the Beeb:
The Hezbollah footage suggests the objects in Israel’s spy-plane video were debris from the blast not weapons.
Pending an investigation, it is impossible to verify either claim.
Reuters is not any better.
Not a word on the glaring discrepancies. It’s just “he said… she said.” So I guess the answer to the question about who Hizbullah takes us for is, “fools.” And the evidence is, they’re right.
Final note: Why did they bother to do this cheap and silly fake as “disproof”? Because they do care what we think, and they want to manipulate us. So if we call them on this stuff, we actually do put the squeeze on them.
So the real question is, “what’s wrong with the Beeb and Reuters?”
i dk if you noticed but everything these days goes by “he said…she said” and often “he said” only (see Goldstone).
this is the new foundation of western civilization.
Comment by oao — October 15, 2009 @ 2:17 pm
So I guess the answer to the question about who Hizbullah takes us for is, “fools.”
Maybe they take us for Goldstone?
Comment by Cynic — October 15, 2009 @ 3:48 pm
So the real question is, “what’s wrong with Reuters?”
They like the deep pockets.
Comment by Cynic — October 15, 2009 @ 3:49 pm
off topic/
Here’s some important news. It undermines even further the notion of a “left-right” political spectrum. The recently published memoirs of Sir Samuel Hoare reveal that Mussolini was a British agent. Towards the end of WW One in 1917, when the British feared that their Russian and Italian allies might be pulling out of the war, they started paying Benito Mussolini, a socialist journalist heretofore, for articles in the Italian press calling for continuing the war, that is, continuing Italian participation. Mussolini got paid 100 pounds per week, a lot of money at that time.
Hoare was a prominent political figure in the UK back in the 30s and 40s. He wrote his memoirs in the 1950s, but they were only published recently.
I don’t know all of the details in Hoare’s book. But I’m sure everyone would like to know when –if ever– he stopped being a British agent.
Comment by Eliyahu — October 15, 2009 @ 4:19 pm
So I guess the answer to the question about who Hizbullah takes us for is, “fools.”
we ARE fools (present company excluded).
They like the deep pockets.
sure. but many of their local reporters are arabs or westerners who would have no career were it not for their access to hezb’allah.
Comment by oao — October 15, 2009 @ 5:04 pm
not to meantion lives.
Comment by oao — October 15, 2009 @ 5:04 pm
My takeaway: Hezbollah was forced to respond. Very very good precedent anyway. Usually Israel’s enemies set the tone and Israel is on the defensive, forced to do the damage control.
Comment by Aviv — October 15, 2009 @ 5:46 pm
1. For a shorter answer ask what’s right with Reuters.
2. I partly agree with Aviv: the initiative was Hezb’s (bringing in weapons, breaching UN resolution) and Israel was quick to denounce it, with sufficient proof, quite well distributed.
But if the deciding heads are gullible enough to buy Hezb propaganda…
Comment by E.G. — October 15, 2009 @ 7:34 pm
Usually Israel’s enemies set the tone and Israel is on the defensive, forced to do the damage control.
what damage? do you think they’re scared they’ve been found out?
as long as the implementation of 1701 is ignored and hexb’allah has veto in govt the only damage is to lebanon and potentially to israel, not to them.
they just moved the weapons from house to house. big deal.
do you really believe that the west will all of a sudden become tough with them? indeed, what reuters does is making sure it won’t, because that’s what it wants to hear.
is there any more evidence needed to figure out what hezb’allah is and what it does?
Comment by oao — October 15, 2009 @ 8:00 pm
what damage? do you think they’re scared they’ve been found out?
Do you think they forged the “counter-proof” for kicks? They had at least two other options:
1. To simply ignored Israel’s video and wait for the criticism to tide over, or
2. To just claim it was fake and expect to be taken at their word, without resorting to a full-blown Hezbollywood production. This is how the Islamic movement handled Israel Police footage of stockpiled rocks, presumably to be used as weapons, inside the Al-Aqsa mosque.
Israel’s forcing the enemy to respond to its own media initiative is a rare, blessed occurrence even if the West is still being willfully dumb about the whole issue. It’s like solving half of a math problem - Better a partial achievement than nothing at all.
Comment by Aviv — October 16, 2009 @ 2:39 am
1st, they did not go to a lot of trouble to construct the rebuttal.
2nd, it is done so poorly and it is so obvious that it’s a lie that it’s ridiculous.
which means that they realize that they did not really need to persuade the west — just throw something in that the gullible ones will swallow lock stock and barrel because that’s what they want to hear anyway. they just gave them an excuse for them to do nothing.
the issue is not whether they responded or not, but that they continue to violate 1701 and nothing is done about it even when it’s exposed.
the rest is conversation.
Comment by oao — October 16, 2009 @ 9:34 am
I agree with both oao & Aviv on this.
But getting back to Hizbullah’s willing accomplices among the Western press:
Michael Totten reports this conversation in Beirut:
I am amazed all over again every time I meet a Westerner in Lebanon who admires Hezbollah or gets defensive on its behalf. Last time I visited Beirut I ran into an American journalist who said Hezbollah “is trying to raise awareness of Global Warming. Don’t you think that’s interesting?”
http://www.michaeltotten.com/archives/2009/10/patterns-of-dic.php
As RL says, the liars need dupes, willing or otherwise, unwitting or witting. But this bird who spoke to Totten seems terminally stupid.
Comment by Eliyahu — October 17, 2009 @ 2:18 pm
oao - The conversation, IMHO, counts for a lot. Improving it - indeed, clearing the Augean Stables - could improve many lives around the world, including yours and mine.
Comment by Aviv — October 17, 2009 @ 4:57 pm
As RL says, the liars need dupes, willing or otherwise, unwitting or witting. But this bird who spoke to Totten seems terminally stupid.
i keep repeating that the real problem is not hamas, hizb’allah, the taliban — it’s the west proneness to suicide.
The conversation, IMHO, counts for a lot. Improving it - indeed, clearing the Augean Stables - could improve many lives around the world, including yours and mine.
we will have to agree to disagree on that. conversation is OK, after all i participate in it, but i am extremely skeptical of its effect.
Comment by oao — October 18, 2009 @ 11:24 am
http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/2009/10/freed-reporter-smashes-us-policy-myths.html
see what i mean?
Comment by oao — October 18, 2009 @ 1:16 pm
and more:
http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/2009/10/how-and-why-engagement-with-sudan-shows.html
Comment by oao — October 18, 2009 @ 1:18 pm
Eliyahu,
As RL says, the liars need dupes, willing or otherwise, unwitting or witting. But this bird who spoke to Totten seems terminally stupid.
There are plenty of them and for example Roger Cohen’s latest seems to demonstrate that many of them are to be found in one place.
An Ordinary Israel
Comment by Cynic — October 18, 2009 @ 2:44 pm
cynic,
it looks as if there is no limit to his idiocy.
having utterly failed in his iran screeds he now turns screeds on israel which are as ignorant.
no matter how idiotic you are you can always publish in nyt.
Comment by oao — October 18, 2009 @ 3:48 pm
Here’s an interesting idea:
Rename the Streets for Neda
How long did it take to do it for little Mohammad al-Dura?
Comment by E.G. — October 19, 2009 @ 6:36 pm
getting back to the idiot who spoke to Totten above.
He probably doesn’t know that
1) the environmentalist movement was preceded 100 years ago in America by the conservationist movement. This latter movement was led by Teddy Roosevelt, inter alia. He and many other Republicans supported the movement.
The leftists and “progressives” etc. of the time were against it.
2) Hitler was fond of goody goody movements. He was a vegetarian, a eugenicist, and so on.
How can these “journalists” be so simple minded? Maybe that’s what their employers want.
Comment by Eliyahu — October 20, 2009 @ 6:41 am
How can these “journalists” be so simple minded? Maybe that’s what their employers want.
there are many factors underlying stupidity: there is usually ignorance and lack of appreciation/acquisition of knowledge, genetics, childhood environment (parents, schools, friends) etc.
but when it comes to modern stupidity, particularly history, politics, economics ignorance has a major contribution. most of those people are schooled, not educated, like alibama who went to good schools but is a moron when it comes to history, economics, foreign cultures, etc.
Comment by oao — October 20, 2009 @ 11:02 am
also, go and check out the programs at journo schools (some journos don’t even go through them) — see what they are taught.
since hiring them does not require more than that, the consequences are pretty logical and not surprising.
Comment by oao — October 20, 2009 @ 11:04 am
[…] other words, the “excuses” of helping negotiations by not attacking the people we’re supposed to negotiate with, are illegitimate. Because we […]
Pingback by Augean Stables » Look who’s a fan of the Goldstone Report: Jihadis spell out Cognitive Warfare 101 — October 21, 2009 @ 4:34 am
what about complicit academia?
http://www.dianawest.net/Home/tabid/36/EntryId/1073/What-Next-Yale-in-Ramallah.aspx
Comment by oao — October 21, 2009 @ 2:44 pm
here are examples of journos who at least one of which and probably both have never gone through any journo school and who know zilch about the ME:
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/pollak/135072
Comment by oao — October 21, 2009 @ 2:59 pm