The Image of Muhammad al-Dura

The IHT is reporting a new development in the case of Muhammad al-Dura: Two French journalists have now expressed concerns about the footage of young al-Dura's death in September 2000.

The images of 12-year-old Muhammad al-Dura crouching in fear behind his father during a Gaza shootout between Israeli soldiers and Palestinians are iconic in the Arab world, symbols of Israeli monstrousness, and of American support for -- and indifference to -- an extreme brutality that targets children.

Hundreds of poems have been written about the boy, streets and parks in various Arab countries have been named for him, stamps have been issued featuring the images, and a (falsified) montage of his shooting was shown constantly on Palestinian TV during Arafat's extended campaign of anti-Israel media incitement. There was even a PA spot that combined images of al-Dura with a fictitious statement attributed to him, one inviting others to join him in his martyrdom.

There were several camera crews present at the Gaza shootout, but only the Palestinian cameraman for the French TV network France 2 took any images of al-Dura. Those images have been the subject of debate virtually since their original broadcast. In its initial report, France 2 stated unequivocally that the boy was shot by Israelis. In the uproar of outrage that followed, the IDF accepted responsibility for the death, claiming it was unintentional.

Subsequent investigation and reenactments, however, raised questions about whether the Israelis were actually responsible. James Fallows investigated the al-Dura case for The Atlantic in 2003, concluding that "the physical evidence of the shooting was in all ways inconsistent with shots coming from the IDF outpost." A French writer named Gerard Huber argues in his book Contre expertise d'une mise en scene that the al-Dura shooting was a staged event.

France 2's handling of the original, uncut tape has been enigmatic. When a German TV network examined the shooting, it asked for France 2's master tape; France 2 declined to provide it. (The Germans also concluded that the IDF could not have shot al-Dura.) Charles Enderlin, France 2's Jerusalem correspondent, has maintained that it would be unethical to show all the images on the master tape, apparently because it contains images of the boy's death agony. "In view of the fact that some parts of the scene are unbearable," Enderlin wrote to The Atlantic, "France 2 was obliged to cut a few seconds from the scene."

But now two French journalists have seen what France 2 says is the entire 27 minutes of tape shot by the network's cameraman, and there seems to be no such footage. Daniel Leconte, a former correspondent for France 2, and Denis Jeambar, editor in chief of the newsweekly L'Express, note that the image of Muhammad al-Dura "has had great influence," adding carefully that "If this image does not mean what we were told, it is necessary to find the truth." Their essay appeared in the newspaper Le Figaro.