"We will continue our struggle," Dr. Hanan Ashrawi tells oregon audience

[Hanan Ashrawi], who also heads the Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy, first addressed the violent attacks on America and expressed the sentiments of the Palestinian people. "We do share your pain," she stated, adding that there is "a need to know and a will to rectify" realities in the world. She condemned Osama bin Laden's use of the Palestinian cause as a reason for terrorism. "The Palestinian cause is not up for grabs," she said. "We refuse to have our cause distorted." Ashrawi insisted that Palestinians, who have "the most compelling and longest-standing grievance in the region," will not accept a system of bantustans. "We will continue our struggle for independence and freedom," she said, explaining that the idea of a Palestinian state no longer was taboo. Such a state, she said, "must be implementable"--a viable state existing on the 22 percent of land remaining to Palestinians, with Jerusalem as its capital. It will require political will and courage to achieve this, Ashrawi said. Discussing the July 2000 Camp David debacle for which Yasser Arafat has received so much criticism, Ashrawi emphasized that "there was no generous offer" by Israeli Prime Minister [Ehud Barak]. The meeting was held "under duress," she explained, at a time when Barak was losing his coalition and then-President Bill Clinton was nearing the end of his term. Barak's so-called "offer" came with a "military mindset," she said, in which Israel would maintain sovereignty over Jerusalem and retain functional control of all of the holy sites.