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Hello and welcome to NewsHour.
It's coming to you live from the BBC World Service Studios in central London.
I'm Tim Franks.
and we're beginning with the sound of lines being sharpened.
If that sounds a bit abstract, it's because it is.
While we're talking about one of the world's longest-running and certainly currently bloodiest conflicts,
today is all about the politics and the language around that conflict.
And that's
because later today we're expecting France to become the latest Western country formally to recognise the state of Palestine.
their move will follow Britain, Canada, Australia and Portugal doing so yesterday.
The first visible sign of the change was evident in West London this morning at a flag-raising ceremony outside what will become the Palestinian Embassy.
But what do the ceremonials portend?
Where might all this lead?
It's our main story today.
And before we try to hear the arguments in favour and try to test the case for them,
let's hear the argument against recognition now, or indeed ever, of a Palestinian state.
The Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has called it a reward for terror.
This is what his Minister for Diaspora Affairs, Amichai Chikli, had to tell NewsHour yesterday.
What does it mean to take a microphone and declare an non-existent state with zero sovereign capabilities that supports terror?