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"I don't see what the controversy is," said Carl Gregory, principal at Morton Street Middle School in Newark, who brought some students to watch Baraka. The poem "is definitely not anti-Semitic." >>>>

Sad but true, read on. I just wonder what they teach during Black History Month?http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/741563/posts

http://www.northjersey.com/cgi-bin/page.pl?id=5182484

Supporters back Baraka's defiant stand

PAUL H. JOHNSON

NEWARK - In an angry, defiant speech, Amiri Baraka lashed out against charges his poetry is anti-Semitic and vowed not to resign his post as the state's poet laureate.

"I will not apologize and I will not resign," said Baraka, arguing that the attempt to link his poem, "Somebody Blew Up America," to anti-Semitism "is fundamentally an attempt to defame me."

Baraka made his remarks in the keynote address at the Newark Public Library's celebration of its designation as a New Jersey Literary Landmark. Dozens came to cheer on Baraka - one middle-school principal brought some of his students - and agreed with his attempts to preserve his right to be a political poet.

"I don't see what the controversy is," said Carl Gregory, principal at Morton Street Middle School in Newark, who brought some students to watch Baraka. The poem "is definitely not anti-Semitic."

Last week, Governor McGreevey asked Baraka to step down as the state's poet laureate after the Anti-Defamation League complained that Baraka's poem, which he read at the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation's Poetry Festival last month, is anti-Semitic. The governor has not rescinded his request, but Baraka cannot be fired according to the legislation that created his post. The job lasts for two years and pays $10,000.

"The Israelis didn't pull the attack, but they knew to get their people out," Baraka said Wednesday. Those rumors, which were circulated by Arab media in the Middle East after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, were discredited.

In the poem, which poses a series of rhetorical questions asking who is responsible for various acts of destruction and terrorism, including slavery, the Holocaust, and Sept. 11 , Baraka asks:

"Who knew the World Trade Center was gonna get bombed

"Who told 4000 Israeli workers at the Twin Towers

"To stay home that day

"Why did Sharon stay away?"

The stories were refuted through media reports and denied by the Israeli government.

Citing articles he read in magazines and stories he pulled off the Internet, Baraka said he can support his allegation that Israel had prior knowledge of the attacks and moved Jewish workers out of the Twin Towers to protect them.

The Anti-Defamation League was not buying Baraka's defense of his controversial poem and said his words are clearly anti-Semitic.

"He's added insult to injury," said Chai Goldstein, New Jersey regional director of the ADL.

"It only shows how out of touch he is. He's an anachronism but a dangerous one, only because he has the title of poet laureate of the state of New Jersey."

Baraka says his poem lashes out at imperialism of any kind and lambastes the oppression of Jews in the past as much as it criticizes the Israeli government.

"Neither Israel or Zionism is the same thing as Judaism," Baraka said. "The ADL's attack is just to confuse people."

Goldstein, who was not at Baraka's presentation, later disagreed in a phone interview.

"You can't separate Israel from Judaism. It's impossible," he said. Baraka asked the ADL to debate him to prove his poem is anti-Semitic, but Goldstein declined.

Many in the library audience saw the attack on Baraka as unwarranted, saying his long history as a radical activist and poet should have been obvious to McGreevey and others when he was appointed poet laureate.

"I figure if Governor McGreevey didn't want someone controversial as poet laureate, he shouldn't have picked Amiri Baraka," said Colleen Lutolf of Glen Ridge, a member of the Spiral Bridge Writer's Guild in Montclair, a poets collective that came out to support Baraka, who will turn 68 on Monday.

She said she didn't think Baraka was writing his poem to defame the Jews.

"I don't think any poet would write any work with hate as a motivator," Lutolf said.

Poet Lily Hodge of Bloomfield agreed.

"I think [the poem] does what he intended it to do. He wanted to get people to question their information sources."

Baraka wrote his poem last year shortly after Sept. 11. He said he has read the poem at various festivals all around the world and never got the reaction to his work that he received from the ADL.

He vowed to perform his duties as poet laureate, even if McGreevey continues to ask for his resignation. A spokesman for the governor said Wednesday that McGreevey continues to demand the resignation of Baraka, who took office barely a month ago.

"Let us begin to prove that the poetic mind, the artistic mind, is stronger than the imperialist mind," Baraka said. He asked his audience to bring truth and beauty into the world and called on them to "poet on!"

"I have just begun to fight."

Paul H. Johnson's e-mail address is johnsonp@northjersey.com

Here's another article

Somebody blew up free speech

http://www.northjersey.com/cgi-bin/page.pl?id=5191298

Bill to fire Baraka being drawn

http://www.northjersey.com/cgi-bin/page.pl?id=5221063