The experts say the inspectors cannot move so quickly that it looks like a deliberate provocation to Iraq.

The horrors that they left behind them were a deliberate provocation to the rescuers who would come in at first light.

"Merely offending through ignorance cannot hope to equal the effects of deliberate provocation."

The officers take his words as a deliberate provocation and order the men below decks.

This dirt thing was a deliberate provocation for us to call them, and we did.

Her eyes were dark with wariness, but the spirit that flashed there suggested his deliberate provocation was having an effect.

Kate decided for the moment to ignore both the deliberate provocations and the telephone.

Although many thought it was a "deliberate provocation to create sectarian divisions", the violence lasted for two years.

Yet if that were the case, it was also a substantial escalation, a deliberate provocation.

Some claim it was a deliberate provocation by the communists to discredit the opposition.