It has often been said throughout time that a picture is worth a thousand words. Any picture may be worth a thousand words, but only a few tell more than a thousand words. They tell a powerful story, a story poignant enough to change the world and galvanize each of us. These photographers have made their photos bring out a bundle of emotion; they have managed to express the brutality this world has managed to lash out on each other. They have captured such moments that one would think, what have we done or are still doing to each other? We should warn our readers that some of these pictures may upset them, while others may fill them with joy. But that’s precisely because these images reflect some of the best and worst parts of the human experience and world events.
We always try our best to credit each and every photographer, but sometimes it’s impossible to track some of them. Please leave a comment if you know the missing authors.
- Jewish Prisoners After Being Liberated From A Death Train, 1945.
- Nazi soldiers react as they are forced to watch footage from concentration camps.
- A German girl enjoys the moment of a lifetime after being reunited with her father, a World War II prisoner, released by the Soviet Union. She had not seen her father since she was one-year-old. (1956)
- Dorothy Counts, one of the first black students to enter the newly desegregated Harry Harding High School is mocked by whites on her first day of school.
- Residents Of West Berlin Show Children To Their Grandparents Who Reside On The Eastern Side, 1961
- 12-year-old Diego Frazão Torquato plays the violin at his teacher’s funeral. The same teacher helped him escape poverty and violence through music.
- Rwanda Massacre – A group of Hutus began slaughtering the Tutsis in the African country of Rwanda. The genocide left 800,000 dead. This photo shows the bloody feet of children attempting to escape slaughter by climbing the walls. (1994)
- A Russian war veteran kneels beside the tank he spent the war in, now a monument.
- An Iraqi Shiite woman weeps after discovering the identity card of a relative during a search for the remains of loved ones pulled from a mass grave in Mahawil, Iraq. The mass grave containing over 3,000 bodies was discovered near Hilla in central Iraq. Hundreds of families traveled to the site with the hope of locating the remains of relatives missing since the 1991 Shiite uprising. May 2003.
- A Syrian kid protecting his little sister from airstrikes.
- A firefighter breaks down in the wreckage of the World Trade Center following a terrorist attack
- An earthquake survivor, sitting on the remains of his home, looks at a family photo album. The 2008 quake in Sichuan, China, measured 8.0 and killed nearly 70,000 people.
- A North Korean man waves his hand as a South Korean relative weeps, following a luncheon meeting during inter-Korean temporary family reunions at Mount Kumgang resort October 31, 2010. Four hundred and thirty-six South Koreans were allowed to spend three days in North Korea to meet their 97 North Korean relatives, whom they had been separated from since the 1950-53 war.
- A photograph posted by Army Public Student, Talha Munir Paracha, on his Facebook page recreating a previous photo taken before the Peshawar attack. The attack left over 130 kids dead including two of Talha’s friends as could be seen in the above photo.
- A Palestinian boy groans in agony after coming home from school and realizing that his family house had been demolished.
- A boy holds his mother’s leg as he cries in front of their damaged house after a strong 6.6 magnitude earthquake at Longmen village, Lushan county in Ya’an, Sichuan province.
- 12-year-old Afghan girl Tarana Akbari is pictured screaming in horror among piles of bodies moments after a suicide bomber killed 80 people at Ashura day ceremonies at a Shiite shrine in Kabul.
- A mother and her 3 year-old daughter, who were attacked with acid by their husband, father find comfort in each other’s arms.
- A girl with cancer who draws her wish on mirror
- Clara Grantt is reunited with her husband’s body after more than 60 years. Sergeant Joseph Grantt went missing during the Korean war.
- In the rubble of a collapsed factory this couple was found in a tight embrace.
- Mohammed Kutkut, 14, covers his face as he sits next to a sign for his slain friend, Ahed Qaddas who was killed during Israeli bombing of Gaza Strip.
- Robert Peraza pauses at his son’s name on the 911 Memorial during the tenth anniversary ceremonies at the site of the World Trade Center.
- A boy weeps out a sigh of relief after rescuing his sister from underneath the rubble of their home, Syria. (2014)
