The New York Times' caption under the picture of the Gaza girls

I commented on that picture here.  Here is the lame response of the public editor: "The caption certainly could have been better. But after gathering information from the photographer and an assistant foreign editor, looking at the photographer’s original description of the photograph, looking at other photographs from the same shoot and thinking about the caption’s multiple purpose, I think that criticism is overstated.   Douglas Schorzman, an assistant foreign editor, told me that it wasn’t clear to editors in New York how damaged the building was. “If it was leveled, we just should have said so,” he said. But “on deadline and in the moment, we may not have known that.” And in fact, it wasn’t leveled, so it made sense to be cautious.   I exchanged e-mail messages with Mr. Hicks, who wrote that the school was not “completely destroyed.”   “The building was still standing but not safe or in any condition to be occupied by students,” he said. His original written description, provided to editors on Saturday, said only that the school was damaged." (thanks Luay)