POV: Massacre in Gaza

Photo: Yasser Saymeh/AFP-Getty Images
The New York Times reports today that more than 200 Palestinians were massacred by the Israeli military strikes. Being The New York Times, it tempers its headlines by pointing out that these military strikes were in retaliation for the "rockets" launched by the militant wing of Hamas on the towns of Southern Israel.

It also features Attack in Gaza, a slideshow which has many photographs of the horrific casualties and devastation. The accompanying article is also well worth a read.

Whenever I read and hear of such violence committed against Palestinians by one of the world's most powerful military machinery, while the so-called civilized West and the rest of the world watches it do so placidly, impotently and in some cases with complicity, I remember Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel's ringing words:

"...to remain silent and indifferent is the greatest sin of all..."

Will you finally speak out Mr Wiesel, or is the Palestinian corpse in the above picture not worth it?

Alice Smeets: UNICEF Photo of the Year

Image © Alice Smeets-All Rights Reserved
It' always a pleasure to hear of young emerging photographers gaining awards and wide recognition for their work, and here's one who just did that.

The young Belgian photographer Alice Smeets won the international photo competition "UNICEF-Photo of the Year". Her winning picture is of a girl in the largest slum in Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital. Although this girl lives amidst mud, litter and refuse, she still wears a clean white dress with ribbons in her hair.

Alice is a freelance photographer based in Belgium, who says she seeks to document "the cruelties the human race has to deal with. I want to touch people’s feelings without shocking them to provoke a reaction as a result."

She won the Canon Profifoto Förderpreis 01/08, was finalist for the Inge Morath Award 08 and selected for the Eddie Adams Workshop XXI. Her images has been exhibited at the Photokina 08 in Cologne and projected at “Visa pour L’image” 08 in Perpignan.

Alice Smeets' website is HERE. Check her black & white work on Haiti's Saut D'eau.

Gyula Sopronyi: The Holy River

Image © Gyula Sopronyi-All Rights Reserved
Gyula Sopronyi, originally working for Népszabadságis, Hungary's political daily newspaper, is a freelance photographer with an eye for stories in the faces, expressions and eyes of his subjects. He has won an impressive array of awards and competitions, and attended various Magnum workshops and classes.

Here's one of his galleries, titled The Holy River, of the incomparable Ganges and Varanasi. Other galleries well worth the visit are Gyula's Turkish Baths and the Whale Hunters of the Indonesia's Lamalera.