Notice when those photos were released? I suspect the NYT had them for a while but waited to publish them until it was too late to make a difference. Phil Boerner provided the photos. He and Barry are still friends. There is no way he would photoshop them to make Barry look bad. Now I won’t rule out that they were holding hands and that was blurred and other things added in. But the photos are real and were provided by a friend of Barry’s. I can’t explain why they look funny but any of us could contact Phil Boerner and simply tell him that lots of people are seeing 10 fingers(holding hands) and can he explain that since there were his photos, taken by him and provided to the NYT by him. :)He might respond. You never know.
A/P cropped the photo, removing the Paki, and published first. NYT published the following day!