(VOVworld) – Israeli President Shimon Peres said Tuesday that his Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected a peace deal in 2011 that Peres secretly negotiated with Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas.

Israeli President Shimon Peres at the President's residence in Jerusalem, April 28, 2014. (Photo: Flash 90)

Peres said he and Abbas completed a draft deal after several secret meetings in Jordan, but Netanyahu rejected it to “wait for a better deal from Tony Blair, the official envoy of the Middle East Quartet”. Peres said he waited for a better deal for several days, even though the first deal resolved all issues and was just waiting to be signed.
This is not the first time that secret talks between Peres and Abbas were revealed. In August, 2011, at a meeting with Fatah, Abbas said he attended four negotiation rounds with Peres, who signed the 1993 Oslo Accord establishing the Palestinian National Authority (PA). A fifth talk was scheduled to be held in Amman, Jordan, but Peres did not attend, because he had no support from the Israeli government for the peace deal.