President Shimon Peres on Sunday announced that he would not attend the World Economic Forum being held in Morocco at the end of the month because King Muhammad VI had refused to meet with him during his planned visit.The Arabic media is reporting that Arab states, including Syria, Libya and especially Saudi Arabia, put intense pressure on Morocco's King Muhammad to shun Peres, especially after there were other press reports in the Israeli media that the king had invited Peres to meet.
According to reports from Beit Hanassi, King Muhammad let it be known that Peres is an Israeli figure held in high esteem in Morocco but that at time was not ripe for a meeting between the two leaders due to tension caused over the stalemate in peace talks with the Palestinians.
The current Arab League trend is to avoid having Israeli leaders step foot on Arab soil, including Egypt and Jordan, in order to further isolate Israel politically, according to the article.