Reuters, AP photographers face off on important story

Reuters was the first out of the gate with their intrepid photographer, poised to take the picture that would perfectly illustrate all the subtleties of the conflict in one iconic image:

The convoy of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas arrives at the residence of Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem November 19, 2007.

A few seconds later, the AP photographer, clearly upset over missing this scoop, decided to take his photo with a bigger focus on the Israeli security guard with the gun, especially having him look to the side ominously:

An Israeli security guard stands in the street as the convoy of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas arrives at Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's residence for a meeting in Jerusalem, Monday, Nov. 19, 2007.

Then the AP photographer took advantage of his position to take a second photograph a few seconds after this one, designed to appeal more to the news editors who preferred landscape orientation:

The Reuters photographer, livid at this escalation in the cycle of wire service photographer violence, pushed the AP photographer out of the way to create his iconic landscape representation of the scene, also with the sideways glance:

Either that, or one must conclude that wire-service journalists are just sheep who don't try to find news nearly as much as they just lazily follow what everyone else is doing.