Israel's continued ban on allowing reporters into Gaza is generating a mounting series of stories, from NPR (featuring McClatchy Foreign Editor Roy Gutman) to CNN (featuring Anderson Cooper, below, trying to sound like he knows something about Gaza when he doesn't seem to know much), to the Los Angeles Times.

And still the Israeli government is refusing to let reporters into Gaza.

Earlier this week, Israel once again opened its border with Gaza to let out hundreds of residents with foreign passports. Had Israel wanted to let reporters in, this would have been the latest chance.

But, no.

Instead, the Foreign Press Association is tied up in court, filing motions and "procedural pre-warnings" that all-but-assure that the legal battle will be tangled until the fighting stops.

Israeli officials like Danny Seaman have made it clear that they are in no hurry to let reporters into Gaza.

But, at the same time, Israeli officials are complaining that you can't trust the information coming out of Gaza.

"Hamas is making sure the pictures coming out of Gaza suit its propaganda needs," Mark Regev, spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told me yesterday.

Of course, the way to get better information out of Gaza would be to let journalists in.

Mark pointed out that the Israeli military has allowed four cameramen embed with the soldiers, but it is only four people and embedding with Israeli forces means you get a limited view of the fighting from the Israeli side.

It makes it difficult for Israel to complain that Hamas is trying to manipulate the media when Israel is doing its best to manage its media image of the war by preventing reporters from getting into Gaza to cover what's happening.