Egyptian Newspaper Alters Photo To Show Mubarak In Front Of Obama

An Egyptian state newspaper is coming under fire after it was revealed that it altered a photo of President Hosni Mubarak to place him at the front of a group of Middle East leaders meeting President Obama--rather than where he was, at the back of the group.

Earlier this month, Mubarak and the heads of Israel, the Palestinian Authority and Jordan met with Obama at the White House to discuss the Israel-Palestine peace process. Afterwards, photographers snapped this image of the group, with Mubarak walking behind the others:

But, as Egyptian blogger Wael Khalil spotted, the state-run Egyptian paper Al Ahram doctored the image to place Mubarak at the head of the group:

News outlets around the world--including in Egypt--picked up Khalil's report. Reacting to the coverage, Khalil tweeted, "Currently enjoying my moment as a famed blogger."

The New York Times' Robert Mackey noted that, even though Al Ahram is being mocked for the altered image, the picture is still up on its website as of Thursday.

Comments

[floater]

09:17 AM on 09/20/2010

Highlights that there is technology now to do this kind of thing. This is something we will see more and more. Sometime in the future the press will not tell us that anything has been changed.

[liberalrebuttal]

12:28 AM on 09/20/2010

ROFLMAO.

That is tooooo funny.

[King Cashaw]

12:24 AM on 09/20/2010

They also inverted him.

[LisaCACO]

09:30 PM on 09/19/2010

egyptian news has always done stuff like this. they are trying to put mubarak (and before that, Sadat) at the center of middle east peace negotiations. it's standard operating procedure. you should read the papers when the ambassadors come to visit the egyptian ambassador. the newspapers are a riot.

[ItsAD]

09:12 PM on 09/19/2010

Maybe the Egyptian president just has legs that don't cast shadows?

[33Greeper]

05:40 PM on 09/19/2010

This is also something Fux Noise would do.

[Schoolgirl666]

10:12 AM on 09/20/2010

You mean ....adding people to the DC mall event.....splicing in film from the fall versus summer.

[GummedUp TheWorks]

02:12 PM on 09/19/2010

Reminds me of:

http://www.spotthedifference.com/

[blitznstitch]

12:19 PM on 09/19/2010

Yea! our president is the alpha dog!

[Caymus77]

12:17 PM on 09/19/2010

Looks like Mubarek is learning from Fox News!

[studmoose]

08:13 AM on 09/20/2010

Perhaps it's FOX's partial Muslim ownership that's responsible?

Oh, that' right - NONE of their primary owners are American born - They're all foreign borns.

NO real US loyalty for any of them!

[BcemXAHA]

10:06 AM on 09/19/2010

They should use an Apple for their graphics work, the pictures may appear more convincing {WEG}

[HazMat5]

04:16 AM on 09/19/2010

Where's Nikolai Ivanovich?

[Gunner Asch]

12:17 PM on 09/19/2010

The only association I can remember for Nikolai Ivanovich is from the Tom Lehrer song +- accusing N.I. Lobachevsky of plagiarism...even Mr Google isn't helping me out here; too many other Nikolai Ivanovich's. Help us out here?

[fishnetdiver]

02:38 AM on 09/19/2010

give it a couple of weeks and this will be splashed all over Fox to show how President Obama cow-tows to the arab nations and is a follower not a leader.

[GummedUp TheWorks]

02:11 PM on 09/19/2010

A couple of minutes...

[pierre F Lherisson]

12:54 AM on 09/19/2010

I have been reading the English edition of the Al~Ahram Weekly since the mid 1990's. I have noticed that Al~Ahram Weekly shows the picture of the president of the Arab Republic of Egypt, Muhammad Hosni Sayyid Mubarak in every publication. Al~Ahram Weekly tends to convey the impression that Mubarak is the most important leader in Egypt or perhaps in the Middle East. This latest photo-shop manipulation speak volume about Al~Ahram objectivity. Who knows how many facts and pictures Al~Ahram fabricated or manipulated in the past and never get caught. Al~Ahram has very competent writers and reporters but its credibility from now on becomes questionable. This reminds me of a NYC union paper that always publish the picture of its Executive Director in every publication. It is a cult of personality that becomes very annoying with the passage of time.

[LisaCACO]

09:32 PM on 09/19/2010

exactly. I love reading the paper tho'. makes me giggle.

[GoDems2012]

07:12 PM on 09/18/2010

He's got the walk of a political gangsta and I can see why one could be intimidated and desperate enough to do this easily verifiable thing.

[TheSardonicAtheist]

06:51 PM on 09/18/2010

Well, what do you expect? Whoever runs the story is obviously going to put forth their favorite first in support of their country.