More Photo Controversy at the Times

The Times checks out the authenticity of several photos it used from disgraced photographer Adnan Hajj, the Reuters freelancer caught doctoring photos from Lebanon to make damage caused by Israel look worse. Plus: Another photo controversy, this one about a false caption to a photo showing the aftermath of an Israeli airstrike in Tyre, Lebanon.

Thepaper finally gets around to the story of how bloggers caught Adnan Hajj, the Lebanese photographer who doctored photos he took for the Reuters news service to make Israel's attacks look more damaging than they actually were.

According to Katharine Seelye and Julie Bosman, the Times has published eight of Hajj's photos since March 2005, but reviewed them and found nothing amiss: "Times editors said a review of those pictures found none that appeared to have been changed improperly."

In another tempest, a photo by Tyler Hicks that appeared in the paper last month was accompanied by a faulty caption in the online version, which the Times corrects today in its online corrections box:


"A picture caption with an audio slide show on July 27 about an Israeli attack on a building in Tyre, Lebanon, imprecisely described the situation in the picture. The man pictured, who had been seen in previous images appearing to assist with the rescue effort, was injured during that rescue effort, not during the initial attack, and was not killed.


The correct description was this one, which appeared with that picture in the printed edition of The Times: After an Israeli airstrike destroyed a building in Tyre, Lebanon, yesterday, one man helped another who had fallen and was hurt."