by Bob Boynton

Aljazeera [Arabic] did it again. They gave us photos of the president and the prime minister of Palestine on back to back days.

I wrote about the photos on March 5 and 6 because I was interested in the way the background figured in the ‘texture’ of the photographs. Now they have done it again — March 14 and 16.

This was the photo on March 14. It looks like a picture taken on the fifth. This photo is from March 16.

In the March 14 photo they are ‘apart’ and not looking at each other with their feet firmly planted. That has to be the very picture of a pose only because they have to.

March 16 and they are touching. The separation that seemed unbridgeable has been spanned. But it was the feet that made the original such a strong separation. Because in these two photo the background is effectively the same — a gray drapery and a limp flag. There is nothing there that is alive.

Of course, separation may be signaled by an empty smile.

Interpretation

In news media the photographs often play the role of a non-verbal headline. Just as the headline tells the reader what is to come so does the photo. And the two may not be consistent. A story about progress in negotiations that is pictured with the photo from March 5 and March 14 belie ‘progress.’

As for Mr. Bush — it is hard to believe he is there at all.

News Reports

Aljazeera [Arabic] March 14

Aljazeera [Arabic] March 16

I cannot give the urls because these are on a page that does not change its url but changes it content more often than once a day.