P.J. O'Rourke on Israel's decision to keep reporters away from its recent military actions:

OpinionJournal - War, unlike politics, can go on without reporters

Actually, it's a mistake. (Something Israel seems to have realized, since it has partially lifted the ban.) Journalism is the opposite of pancake makeup and boudoir lighting. The farther journalists get away from you, the worse you look. But attempting to control news during a war is too usual to be labeled outrageous. Stalin didn't ban journalists from Stalingrad. He sent them there. They couldn't refuse. I'd rather be banned. And there was censorship in the Soviet press anyway. The International Federation of Journalists is right. Censorship did not bring peace. Not that peace with Germany would have been a good idea.

As always, informative and entertaining.