The marquis of Nasrallah on the side of the building is pretty dark compared to the rest of the photograph. I'm still a novice in Photoshop, but it looks to me as if the contrast was pumped up so Nasrallah's face wasn't in the dark. It resulted in washing out the rest of the image.
As to the words hanging in the sky, I'd assumed they were letters on posts. You don't see them often in the US anymore but they're still around.
I'm not sure, but it looks like the photo was taken in the early evening maybe 30 minutes to an hour before sunset. You will notice that no direct sunlight is on the tank, but there obviously is behind it. Take a look some day when you are out driving around and you will see that the lighting can do weird things as sunset approaches.
Don't get me wrong, it doesn't surprise me at all to find out that Reuters, AP, etc. are doctoring photos. I'm just not sure about this one.
Something like this? I found others with even fewer supports, but they were too big to post. Between blurring in the distance and jpeg compression I could see how the supports would disappear.