Altering images to adapt reality to suit ideological needs or interests has been a widespread practice before Photoshop even existed. Historic photographs cannot always be trusted: their apparent role as witnesses through the ages make them accepted as pieces of evidence when they are not. They reflect a scene often set up artificially, and always edited or angled, far more than actual reality. The reality is modified to fit the goals of interest groups, so photographs tell more about who manipulated them to serve a certain purpose than about the event itself.
This is what happened with Pete Souza’s now iconic image of the Situation Room where the Obama national security team was watching the raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan.
The original photo was taken as the raid occurred and shows Hillary Clinton in the center of the room, with her hand over her mouth. But as a Jewish blog, Failed Messiah (a blog which covers the Orthodox Jewish Community with a critical eye) first spotted, the Yiddish-language daily newspaper Der Tzitung published a modified picture on Friday 6th May.
Der Tzitung is described by the Jewish Week as “ultra-Orthodox” and has a policy of never printing photos of women in its pages because it thinks they could be sexually suggestive.
Therefore they simply removed Hillary Clinton and Audrey Tomason (at the back), who works as director for counter-terrorism, from the picture.
Der Tzitung sent a statement to the press, apologising for altering the photo – which the White House had forbidden news outlets from doing – and explaining why they had removed Clinton and Tomason. Their statement argued that the fact that they refused to publish the womens’ images did not mean they had a lower opinion of women but that they tried to reconcile their American identity with their obligations as Jewish individuals within a particular tradition.
“In accord with our religious beliefs, we do not publish photos of women, which in no way relegates them to a lower status. Publishing a newspaper is a big responsibility, and our policies are guided by a Rabbinical Board. Because of laws of modesty, we are not allowed to publish pictures of women, and we regret if this gives an impression of disparaging to women, which is certainly never our intention. We apologize if this was seen as offensive.
We are proud Americans of the Jewish faith, and there is no conflict in that, and we will with the help of the Almighty continue as law-abiding citizens, in this great country of our’s, until the ultimate redemption.”
Lise Fievet Mailhebiau for Media Diversity Institute
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