ABSTRACT
As John Martin from ABC News said, in Lebanon, Palestinian commanders permitted camera crews and correspondents to move freely into areas under attack, but not to photograph military targets hidden among civilian offices and apartments. Israel, by aiding Lebanese Christians since 1975, has saved more civilian lives than have been lost in the war. Television in war is bound to suggest more generalized destruction than has occurred. Furthermore, had there been television at Antietam on America’s bloodiest day, this would be two nations. The propaganda battle against Israel during the Lebanese war began with the invention by the PLO of the figures of “600,000 homeless civilians” and 10,000 civilians killed in the portion of southern Lebanon taken by Israel. On 10 June, Roger Mudd reported that “the Red Crescent, which is Lebanon’s Red Cross, is quoted as estimating that more than ten thousand civilians have been killed or wounded since Friday.”
