Jewish paper says sorry for Clinton vanishing act Read more

An Orthodox Jewish newspaper apologised for digitally deleting US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton from a photograph of President Barack Obama and his staff watching Navy SEALs move in on Osama bin Laden.

The Brooklyn weekly Der Zeitung, which says it does not publish images of women, printed the doctored photo on Friday.

It issued a statement saying its photo editor had not read the "fine print" accompanying the White House photo that forbade any changes.

The newspaper said it has sent its "regrets and apologies" to the White House and the Department of State.

A second woman, Counterterrorism Director Audrey Tomason, was also deleted from the picture.

The photograph captured a historic moment in the decade-long US effort to apprehend the mastermind of the terrorist attacks on the US on September 11, 2001.

Der Zeitung said it has a "long-standing editorial policy" of not publishing women's images.

It explained that its readers "believe that women should be appreciated for who they are and what they do, not for what they look like, and the Jewish laws of modesty are an expression of respect for women, not the opposite".

The weekly said Mrs Clinton, a Democrat who represented New York as a US senator, had won overwhelming majorities in the Orthodox Jewish communities because they "appreciated her unique capabilities, talents and compassion for all".

Der Zeitung, published in Yiddish, is sold at city newsstands, especially in Brooklyn's Williamsburg and Borough Hall neighbourhoods, which have many Orthodox Jewish residents. It acknowledged it "should not have published the altered picture".

An editor at a Manhattan weekly that has covered Jewish issues since the 1890s addressed why the Brooklyn newspaper might have altered the image.

The Forward's managing editor, Lil Swanson, said that removing women from photos is "in keeping with" the belief of some ultra-Orthodox Jews that showing images of the female form is "immodest".

In the original photo of the White House Situation Room, Mr Obama and his national security team are gathered around a table, following in real time the operation that culminated in the killing of bin Laden at his Pakistani compound on May 1.