Quite a lot of Arabs see Arafat as a pioneer for Palestine and he did win a Nobel Peace Prize. His current party (Fatah) is pretty good compared to Hamas.
Strangely Arafat was friends with both Saddam Hussein and Ayatollah Khomeini
Arafat had an opportunity to create a legitimate and recognized Palestinian state. He turned it down.
I think Yasser Arafat has too much blood on his hands to qualify as a good person. Still, he was a high-profile figure, arguably one of the most familiar and arguably popular faces involving active Middle East politics in the 80s.