To Derar Mousa, a Palestinian who is visiting Snohomish County, Yasser Arafat was a statesman who struggled valiantly on behalf of the Palestinian people.

To Rabbi Harley Karz-Wagman of Temple Beth Or in Everett, he was an obstacle to peace.

But both men agreed that Arafat’s death on Thursday in a Paris hospital could restart negotiations between the Palestinians and Israel and make the establishment of a Palestinian state more likely.

Mousa is staying with his brother, Jamal Mahmoud, an engineer who emigrated to Portland, Ore., in 1986 to attend graduate school. He now lives south of Snohomish.

Mahmoud, 45, had been preparing himself for the death of Arafat for several days. It is still difficult for him to accept that the man who led his people for four decades is gone.

“It’s very sad,” he said Thursday morning. “Just watching the news and seeing people crying – it’s so very sad.

“Arafat was like a symbol for the struggle,” Mahmoud said. “He spent his life trying to free Palestine from occupation.”

Mahmoud and Mousa claim Israel did not negotiate in good faith during previous talks to establish a Palestinian nation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Even though Mousa, 36, believes Arafat’s death might open the way for more talks, he has mixed feelings about where those talks might lead.

“If there is peace, that will mean Israel will stop killing Palestinians and stop demolishing Palestinian houses,” he said as he sipped tea and munched on homemade baklava in Mahmoud’s living room. Mousa returns next week to his West Bank home, which he said has been forcibly taken over four times in the past two years by Israeli soldiers.

But Mousa worries that new leaders are more likely than Arafat to bend to Israeli demands in negotiations.

Mahmoud agreed, saying a just peace is impossible with Israel’s powerful military and the strong backing it receives from the United States.

“Israel has power, and Palestinians are powerless,” he said. “If you want peace, you have to have peace between equal people.”

Mahmoud’s brother-in-law, Alaa Arafat, 33, who lives a few blocks from Mahmoud, is more optimistic. Alaa Arafat pointed to compromises that Israeli leader Yitzhak Rabin made to Yasser Arafat in 1993. Alaa Arafat and Yasser Arafat are not related.

“Israel was going in the right direction before (Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon came to power,” Alaa Arafat said. “I’m sure if they have their land, and the Palestinians have their land, there can be peace.”

Karz-Wagman shares Alaa Arafat’s optimism. He pointed out that Jews and Arabs got along well for centuries in what is now Israel and the Palestinian territories. And he recalled how, during two visits to the West Bank during a peaceful lull in the 1990s, he and others in a delegation of rabbis were well-received by Palestinian business leaders and politicians.

Karz-Wagman is convinced that if Israelis and Palestinians think a lasting peace is possible, they can make the difficult compromises necessary to bring it about.

But he said Yasser Arafat never truly wanted peace, because his power and popularity were predicated on his image as a fighter. Yasser Arafat funded and supported terrorism, Karz-Wagman said. Schools, mosques and the media in the Palestinian territories continue to preach hatred of Jews, he said.

Even so, Karz-Wagman said Yasser Arafat’s success in unifying the Palestinian people created a national identity.

“He gave them a sense of pride and the hope of there being a Palestinian nation,” he said. “That gives them the potential to build themselves up. Ultimately, if there are two prosperous states living next to each other, they won’t fight.”

Gad Barzilai, a professor from Tel Aviv University who is teaching political science and law at the University of Washington, said international economic aid to the Palestinians would be vital to peace, because it would help revive the battered Palestinian economy.

Ellis Goldberg, director of the Middle East Center at the UW, said Arafat’s death and his probable replacement by moderate Palestinian leaders may spur negotiations.

“It will be hard for Israel to sustain the argument that there’s no one to negotiate with,” he said. Sharon had refused to negotiate with Arafat.

But Goldberg doesn’t see much chance of an agreement in the near future.

“It will take time for an alternative leadership to consolidate support and be able to negotiate with Israel,” he said. “A new leader will have to gain legitimacy as Arafat’s successor.”

Reporter David Olson: 425-339-3452 or dolson@heraldnet.com.