Star Jones Reynolds: 'I Was Fired'

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http://people.aol.com/people/article...208160,00.html

Star Jones Reynolds announced Tuesday morning on The View that she'll be leaving the show in July after nine years as a cohost.

"Something's been on my heart for a little bit, and after much prayer and counsel I feel like this is the right time to tell you that the show is moving in another direction for its tenth season and I will not be returning as cohost next year," she said on the air.

"That's shocking to me," interrupted Joy Behar, prompting Jones Reynolds to link hands with her cohosts.

Thanking the show's creator, Barbara Walters, "for giving me the opportunity of a lifetime," Jones Reynolds concluded by saying, "I'm not sure what the future holds, but I'm absolutely sure who holds the future."

After some discussion, Walters said, "It is a new chapter for Star. It will be a new chapter for The View in the fall."

So why is Jones Reynolds leaving? Contrary to speculation that she's unhappy about the upcoming addition of Rosie O'Donnell – one of her most vocal critics – to the show this fall, she reveals exclusively in this week's PEOPLE magazine that the departure was not her choice.

"What you don't know is that my contract was not renewed for the tenth season," she tells PEOPLE. "I feel like I was fired." She adds that she was told her contract wouldn't be renewed just days before news leaked that O'Donnell would be joining The View.

Jones Reynolds, 44, was part of the original lineup with Meredith Vieira (who has already departed to replace Katie Couric on the Today show), Behar and Walters.