A short history of another bullshit scoop

It started on November 23 with a not very exciting news about another explosion in a Hezbollah-linked location in South Lebanon. This is how a Lebanese source reported the story:

A mysterious explosion occurred overnight near the town of Siddiqin in southern Lebanon. The explosion reportedly took place in a large Hezbollah arms depot .

Hezbollah personnel reportedly prevented Lebanese security forces from arriving at the scene of the blast.

The explosion took place in an area which is controlled by United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) and where Hezbollah is not allowed to have weapons under the terms of UN Security Council Resolution 1701 which ended the Second Lebanon War in 2006.

UNIFIL said that blast would be investigated.

Last year, there were a number of large explosions at weapons depots in southern Lebanese villages.

A well informed security source told MTV that the explosion could be either the result of a technical error or sabotage related to the recent capture of CIA operatives.

Notice the date on the article: November 23, 2011. Notice also the reference to other similar events from the last year. Whatever the cause of the explosion, it isn't a singular unique mishap.

It is also worth your attention that the blast happened in the area where Hezbollah isn't supposed to warehouse weapons and ammunition - but who is going to argue with the thugs? This "Hezbollah personnel reportedly prevented Lebanese security forces from arriving at the scene of the blast." says it all... in Lebanon might makes right indeed.

Another Lebanese source (The Daily Star) published an article on the subject even earlier on the same day. It is full of guesswork and, of course, mentions Hezbollah's denial of the claim that the explosion happened in that arms depot: "What has been circulating in the media regarding the explosion in Sidiqqin and that it is related to storage center for Hezbollah is utterly false,” the party said in the statement.

The day after the above mentioned article, the same Daily Star publishes another one, this time meant to dampen the excitement:

The Lebanese Army Wednesday attributed a mysterious explosion in southern woodland to a mine or cluster bomb, after speculation the blast had occurred at a Hezbollah arms storage facility.

A statement by the army said that an explosion close to the southern village of Siddiqin late Tuesday had been investigated and was the result of a combusting land mine or cluster bomb left over from Israel’s 2006 assault.

Surely the Lebanese Army should be considered an objective and independent observer, and we all must bow to its expertize. On the other hand, some people could find in the story a source for celebration:

Simultaneously, in the past two years, some of these arms depots started to explode under mysterious circumstances, like a knife in Hezbollah’s heart.

A flowery image that. I would personally go for some gastric disorder as a better metaphor, but it's a matter of style, of course. Anyway, whatever happens, we can safely conclude that the last blast wasn't one of a kind, but rather one of a chain of similar events* and should be appreciated as such.

However, all of the above was too boring and too pedestrian for a person that aspires to greatness and doesn't stop before a bit of malarkey when his thirst for scoops takes over. I mean the insidious Dickie Silverstein, of course. The explosion still reverberated in the Lebanese hills (remember it happened "overnight" on November 23, 2011), but Dickie was immediately ready with his revelation: Exclusive: Israeli Military Intelligence Caused Massive Explosion in Hezbollah South Lebanon Arms Cache! Notice the date on Dickie's post: same November 23, 2011. There is no time stamp on that opus, but the first comment on it is timed November 23, 2011 at 2:13 AM, meaning that barely several hours have passed from the explosion (taking the appropriate time zones into account). This is important to notice in the light of the "scoop" contents.

The gist of Dickie's "exclusive" is:

Now comes an exclusive report from an authoritative Israeli source with considerable military experience, that IDF military intelligence (Aman) has out foxed Hezbollah by deliberately crash-landing a booby-trapped Trojan Horse drone in southern Lebanon.

Let's try to ignore the convoluted process allegedly invoked by Aman to blow up an ammo warehouse (do they waste a perfectly good drone each time? After all, it isn't a first explosion of the kind). What really jaw-dropping amazes me in this manner of delivering military/intelligence scoops, is the speed of communication between Dickie and his "authoritative Israeli source". Either Dickie has a cell phone number for the source with permission to wake him/her up at any time of the night (yup, it was night in Israel) or the source him/herself sleeplessly awaits for the outcome of the next Aman's (alleged) mischief to report it breathlessly to his best friend from Seattle... imagine that.

Well, I hope the picture is clear by now. There are only two possible explanations of this phenomenon:

a) Dickie, as is appropriate for a moronic scoop seeker is inventing the implausible bullshit by himself. After inexplicably receiving a free "get out of jail" card from US authorities after his last shenanigan, Dickie is craving more publicity, so why not invent a scoop or two?

b) Somebody in Israel (and I wouldn't even try to guess who) is planting bullshit on purpose. And who is better to plant disinformation with than a moronic scoop seeker? After all, his ability to distinguish skinny from a totally implausible fairy tale is nil.

I wouldn't be able to say which of the two above options will be my preference for Dickie. We may learn sometime and have a good laugh on account of this shlemazl. Or we may not, and I wouldn't lose any sleep because of not knowing, believe you me.

Anyway, don't lose no temper because of Dickie. Our life isn't an unending variety show and usually isn't that rich with entertaining clowns of Dickie's kind. Or any other kind, for that matter. So we should be sort of grateful to Dickie for that occasional, albeit unintentional, bit of free laughs.

Well, to round up this long story, I can't do better than wholeheartedly agree with Aussie Dave aka IsraellyCool who, in the post Ynet’s Douche Fixation wonders:

For the second time in a few weeks, Ynet has quoted The DouchebloggerTM as if a legitimate, trustworthy source of information.
...
I am not sure if this propensity to quote Silverstein as a trustworthy source is a general problem at Ynet, or has afflicted only Dudi Cohen, who wrote the previous piece and contributed to this latest one. Either way, it makes me want to ignore Ynet altogether.

Yup. Ynet surely could do much better than using this diploma-ed dork.

(*) One (alleged) detail, however, is fairly interesting. On November 27 an Israeli Internet tabloid published a sequel to the blast story. According to it, three senior (?) Iranian Revolutionary Guard officers expired during the blast, accompanied by two Hezballoons. I start to wonder whether distinguished service in the IRG develops some excessive volatility in the bodies of its senior officers? And whether these previous blasts at various Hezbollah's (officially non-existing, of course) ammunition warehouses coincided with a visit by a senior Iranian or two?

Update: There was another one in Iran this time:

A mysterioius explosion Monday rocked an Iranian city housing a sensitive uranium conversion facility.

The government of Isfahan denied reports that the explosion was linked to the nuclear site, saying it was part of a military drill north of the city.

Let's wait and see what kind of story Dickie will concoct this time.

On the other hand, let's not wait. Let's take a look. Yes, it's already there, and pathetic to the utmost:

I really don’t know what to make of it all. But one thing is for sure, my well-connected source was told by likely Israeli intelligence operatives that Israel caused this explosion. Then a few days later after Lebanese militants rained down missiles on Israel, other intelligence sources told Israeli media a different story. It’s a strange, dark and dangerous world Israelis have made for themselves.

Poor blundering Dickie...