Bin Laden Post-Mortem Photos Coming Soon?

The National Journal reports that in a brief responding to a lawsuit from Judicial Watch seeking "all photographs and/or video recordings" taking during SEAL Team Six's raid on Abbottabad, the Department of Justice concedes that some of the pictures are legally required to be disclosed and could be disclosed without "core" harm to national security.  (Or at least that's what the legal expert National Journal consulted says.  To be honest, it's all Greek to me).

But, honestly, would the release of images of Osama bin Laden with a bullet hole over his eye and caked in blood do anything besides satisfy some people's prurient curiousity?  Is this enough to override the potential harm it could do by offending Muslims worldwide? 

(And note, the question of giving offense obviously shouldn't be the driving determination of our behavior, i.e. defending Salman Rushdie's right to write The Satanic Verses or allowing newspapers to publish cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad without fear of mindless retaliatory violence). 

But given that even al-Qa'ida concedes bin Laden was killed in the raid, I have a hard time seeing any strategic upside to the publication of these pictures as opposed to potential negative second/third-order effects.

Please feel free to comment if you have any thoughts on this.

Apparently, The Onion's photo from May wasn't genuine.