"I always say when you are born a Palestinian you are born with a responsibility and a risk and the name Palestinian in many ways is evocative because it calls for responses. It is not a neutral statement. So we are all political beings but being a politician is not something which I would choose for myself. I would much rather be an academic in a university, to teach, to write, to do research but I felt that this was one responsibility that I couldn't abandon."

Ashrawi experienced the suffering of the Palestinian people for herself. In June 1967, whilst studying English at the American University of Beirut, she heard that her home had been bombed, that her parents might be dead and her town was occupied. She waited at the offices of the Red Cross for news - and discovered that her parents were still alive. She was not able to return home for several years. She was actively involved in student politics and even helped dig shelters in Palestinian refugee camps. It's her passionate commitment to the Palestinian cause that has, she says, driven her on in very difficult circumstances - she sees it as a responsibility that she cannot give up.