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Today's talking points

David Mazower | 13:34 UK time, Wednesday, 2 August 2006

We hope to hear your views on three issues in today's show - the debate in Israel as Israeli troops push deeper into Lebanon....Mel Gibson's drunken outburst and apology.....and why pregnant women have such a hard time getting seats on the metro.

Day after day in our editorial meetings we ask whether it's time to stop talking about Israel and Lebanon and move onto other topics. It's an open debate - there are some big stories (like the Congo election) that in other times we would have aired at length - but judging from your comments and the emails coming into bbc websites, there is still enormous interest in the Middle East war and it's something that people are talking about in their everyday lives in large parts of the world.

Yesterday we split the show between the Mideast and Cuba. Today we've decided to do much the same. We want to reflect the debate in Israel between the small number of anti-war voices and the much larger number of Israelis backing Ehud Olmert. We hope to be speaking to veteran peace campaigner Uri Avnery, whose group Gush Shalom (Peace Bloc) is opposed to Israel's military strategy...and to hear from ordinary Israelis on all sides of the political spectrum.

Mel Gibson's drunken anti-Jewish outburst is also getting a huge number of hits on the bbc news pages, so it's clearly a good talking-point. What do you make of what he said? Is drunkenness ever an excuse for offensive remarks and provocative racist or sexist comments? should he be given a second chance? would you think twice about going to see another Mel Gibson movie after this?

And then there's the Japan pregnancy story.....Japan has starting issuing badges to pregnant women travelling on the country's railway system to make it easier for people to identify them and encourage other passengers to give up their seats. Is it a good idea? Have you ever offered your seat to a pregnant woman only to find out she's not pregnant, just a little on the ample side?

It's your show....we look forward to hearing from you with your views on any of these stories.

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