Well, well, well. All sorts of commentary on the importance of photographs surrounding the assassination of Osama bin Laden and President Obama’s announcement in the East Room with reenactment of his speech for the still cameras.
From the White House Situation Room (now with added memes) and Reuters’ bloody gallery (WARNING: Graphic images of corpses) to whether we deserve or need to see bin Laden’s bullet-riddled head. Then there’s Senator Scott Brown’s faux-pas over a hoax photograph. Not to mention the reported different versions of the actual event.
For all the best articles click on the links over on Raw File Blog’s twitter feed, where I’ve been compiling them all day.
There’s still one photo – to be precise its caption – that is bothering me. And it’s this one:
White House photographer, Pete Souza, captioned the image thus: “President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden, along with members of the national security team, receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the Situation Room of the White House, May 1, 2011.”
Except everywhere I’ve seen it used, the inference is that the White House team are watching a live feed of the raid on bin Laden’s compound.
They might be, but I want a SOURCE.
It seems to me this image may have been interpreted as one thing at an early stage and because it the narrative tied to the body language is so seductive, no-one has chosen to question it.
I think the reading of the image is massively altered depending on whether you think they’re watching murders in progress or whether they are, for example, waiting nervously for the screen to boot up.
Ryan Singel for Wired.com’s Epicenter blog went as far to say the White House “officials watching what one presumes is the livestream of the Navy Seal raid on Osama’s hideout in Pakistan.”
For all the hullabaloo about this image, no-one is actually sure about what is on THAT screen.
So, does anyone have a solid source saying that they are viewing a live feed of the operation?
Prison Photography 
5 comments
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May 4, 2011 at 10:25 pm
m
Pete, Why not go to the source? If I’m not mistaken, Pete Souza is on both FB and twitter.
May 4, 2011 at 10:31 pm
petebrook
Melissa. Of course, you’re right. However, I am not FB friends with Pete, nor has he tweeted for 48 hours (Istill sent him the question). If you’re fB friends with him, could pass along my inquiry along with my blog post? Cheers.
May 5, 2011 at 2:42 am
Andrew
Pete,
I dig your blog. Interesting post here but I have to say that I am not sure I understand where the confusion is. I may be missing something so correct me if I am wrong.
I understand the caption to mean that the president and the NS team are getting info on the death of bin Laden. It looks like the photo was taken on May 1 at 4:05pm from the EXIF data. True, this was right around the time that bin Laden was killed but perhaps they are talking with the commander of the operation in Pakistan on a scheduled video conference call (?) Pete and the WH photogs also may be limited in what they can write in reference to NS, and the caption may have been rearranged or edited.
This is a total guess but I never took it to mean a live feed.
May 6, 2011 at 5:37 am
Thinking Images v.16: Osama Bin-Laden and the pictorial staging of politics | David Campbell
[…] the many arguments calling for the release of a picture of the dead Bin-Laden (see Pete Brook’s post of many links, as well as Joerg Colberg’s and Michael Shaw’s considered statements). In […]
May 7, 2011 at 11:21 am
prisonmovement
Hilary Clintons face says alot…..