“The way to tell a story is all about the people,” NBC News Tel Aviv bureau chief and correspondent Martin Fletcher told an audience of about 400 last night in suburban Chicago, describing how he approaches journalism. “It’s very important to me to be as close-up as possible.”

TVNewser was there as Fletcher spoke in Northbrook, part of a 23-city book tour this month to mark the paperback release of his 2008 memoir, Breaking News. He told the crowd of his nearly 40 years in journalism — 32 with NBC — and his experiences in some of the world’s most dangerous hot spots.

Take an incident almost 30 years ago, on November 15, 1979. In Tehran reporting on the 53 American hostages at the U.S. embassy, he too was taken by Iranian militants. Held for nine hours, Fletcher was transported to the same embassy, making him the first television correspondent inside the occupied building, though not by his choosing.

The episode “wasn’t scary at all,” he tells TVNewser. “I don’t take risks, and I don’t go into dangerous situations,” he explains. “However, my definitions of risk and danger may well be different from most people!”

More from Fletcher about foreign news coverage, and his next book — plus additional photos, after the jump…

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…add a photo to your Wikipedia page.

At 10:35amET on CNN, Heidi Collins interviewed London Times reporter, Martin Fletcher about the Lockerbie Bomber.

Unfortunately, that photo is of NBC News Middle East correspondent Martin Fletcher, not London Times’ Martin Fletcher. Same goes for that bio info. Soon after, CNN switched the on-screen bio to the Fletcher in question, but the picture stayed. You always have to be soo fancy with your graphics, CNN.

NBC News’ Martin Fletcher	London Times’ Martin Fletcher?

The cable news channels have been covering breaking news from Gaza for much of the afternoon. The official word of Israeli Defense Force ground troops moving in to Palestinian territory was reported around 1:40pmET this afternoon, but had been expected for days.

Fredricka Whitfield anchored much of the afternoon on CNN with Don Lemon picking up at 5pmET.

Fox News correspondent David Lee Miller is along the border. Viewers could see IDF troops on the move behind him during his live shots. FNC tells TVNewser they will preempt regular programming until 7pmET at which point Fox Report will air. The network has added two live hours of Geraldo at 8pmET and 10pmET which will cover the crisis.

MSNBC interrupted its afternoon documentaries just after 1:30pmET and has been in live coverage since. Peter Alexander, who anchored the morning show as well, was joined by Chris Jansing at 2pmET from Los Angeles. Contessa Brewer took over for Alexander at 5pmET. With the NFL on NBC there is no Nightly News so network correspondents including Tom Aspell, Martin Fletcher and Andrea Mitchell continue to report for the cable channel.

As for the broadcast networks, it appears CBS News did not have a correspondent in Israel or inside Gaza. SKY News correspondent Dominic Waghorn reported for the CBS Evening News from along the border. For ABC’s “World News,” Miguel Marquez reported from Jerusalem and Simon McGregor-Wood was in Sderot, Israel, near Gaza.

> Update from a reader: CBS Radio correspondent Robert Berger has been filing reports from Jerusalem during the on-the-hour casts all day…

> The New York Daily News’ David Hinckley discusses the opening day of Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski‘s WABC radio show, describing it as “closer to the Imus model.”

> Lesley Stahl‘s double-length oil-related report from Saudi Arabia helped 60 Minutes to another top 10 finish for the week, placing it #7 overall with 13.79 million Total Viewers.

> PBS’ “Worldfocus” features NBC News correspondent Martin Fletcher‘s report from Africa on the situation in Zimbabwe — the first report by a “Big 3″ correspondent for the program.