Bush called his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak to thank him for his efforts to stop Palestinian rocket attacks on southern Israel.

The US will remove a freeze on $100 million earmarked for aid to Egypt, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters in Cairo Tuesday.
The American Congress originally froze this amount for several reasons, most notably due to what it considered a lack of Egyptian will to tighten security on the border with Gaza.
In a joint press conference with Foreign Minister Ahmad Aboul Gheit Tuesday, Rice said that this was now in the past.
“I have exercised on behalf of the United States the waiver in terms of Egyptian assistance,” she said, “the Bush administration sought to have that flexibility. We believe that this relationship with Egypt is an important one and that the waiver was the right thing to do.”
Congress had also attributed the freeze to domestic issues such as human rights violations and slow democratic reform, but it had presented the administration with an option to waive the freeze if it suited the “national security interest of the United States.”

Activists chanting for the Palestinian, Lebanese and Iraqi resistance movements, while burning Bush’s pictures and denouncing Hosni Mubarak, in front of Cairo’s Press Syndicate.

President Bush lavished praise on President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt on Wednesday, emphasizing the country’s role in regional security and the Israeli-Palestinian peace process while publicly avoiding mention of the government’s actions in jailing or exiling opposition leaders and its severe restrictions on opposition political activities.
Ending an eight-day trip through the Middle East in which he highlighted democratic change as the foundation for peace and security throughout the region, Mr. Bush strikingly avoided direct criticism of Mr. Mubarak, an autocratic leader in power since late 1981. In the past, Mr. Bush criticized Egypt for arresting political dissidents.
“I appreciate very much the long and proud tradition that you’ve had for a vibrant civil society,” said Mr. Bush, whose appearance with Mr. Mubarak was unannounced and, according to the White House, had been uncertain until the last minute.
Mr. Bush’s remarks reflected some of the contradictions evident in the issues he addressed on his trip.