The Politics Of Poetry

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By Newsweek Editors

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When the Israeli education minister announced last week that a few of Mahmoud Darwish's poems would appear on the high-school syllabus, a political storm broke out. Though born in what is now Israel, Darwish, 58, is revered as the Palestinian national poet and has written about injustices suffered by his people. He resigned as a senior member of the Palestine Liberation Organization after the signing of the Oslo peace accords. The Education Ministry chose to teach a famous poem about how much Darwish missed his mother's coffee and bread while in jail, but many Israeli politicians argued that other verses were "anti-Zionist." Prime Minister Ehud Barak said "the time is not yet right" to teach Darwish. Still, some of Darwish's poems will be taught as an optional course. NEWSWEEK's Matt Rees and Daniel Klaidman talked to the poet last week in the West Bank town of Ramallah, where he edits a literary magazine. Excerpts:

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