Ms. Rice's Retreat

The secretary of state, who once championed reform in Egypt, waives human rights restrictions on U.S. aid.

EGYPTIAN FOREIGN Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit couldn't conceal his smug satisfaction as he stood next to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at a news conference in Cairo last week. In the past, Mr. Aboul Gheit fumed in such situations as Ms. Rice spoke out about the need for Egypt to move toward democracy or criticized the unjust imprisonment of liberal reformers such as Ayman Nour. Now he watched as, at the prompting of an Egyptian state television reporter, Ms. Rice acknowledged that the Bush administration had quietly waived a congressional hold on $100 million in military aid to Egypt.

The government of Hosni Mubarak hasn't come close to meeting the conditions Congress attached to the money, which are that it protect the independence of the judiciary, stop police abuses and curtail arms smuggling from Egypt to Gaza. In testimony to Congress last month, Margaret Scobey, the nominee to be ambassador to Egypt, said "the government's respect for human rights remains poor, and serious abuses continue." That was an understatement: In fact, the Mubarak government has sought to crush all proponents of democratic liberalization, from a movement of judges to crusaders such as Mr. Nour and Saad Eddin Ibrahim, who has been exiled from Egypt since he shook President Bush's hand at a conference of democratic dissidents last year. Israel says arms continue to pour across the border into Gaza, with Cairo's tacit acquiescence.

The Bush administration once was ready to express its dissatisfaction with Mr. Mubarak in practical ways. Mr. Ibrahim was released from prison in 2003 after Mr. Bush withheld $130 million in supplemental aid requested by Egypt. Mr. Nour was sprung from jail in 2005 after Ms. Rice canceled a visit to Cairo because of his arrest. Yet three years after Mr. Bush promised the world's democratic reformers that the United States would stand with them, the administration has so reversed itself that it joins Mr. Mubarak in rejecting restrictions attached by Congress to aid money.

Ms. Rice said the administration used a waiver built into the legislation so the Egyptian military will get the full $1.3 billion allocated by the administration this year. "We believe that this relationship with Egypt is an important one and that the waiver was the right thing to do," she said. Lamely, she said she had talked about the need for reform with the foreign minister during their private meeting.

"So, she has exercised the right of waiver," declared Mr. Aboul Gheit triumphantly. His was the vindication of a diplomat who has just watched the U.S. secretary of state publicly repudiate the policy she once championed, in order to appease an autocrat. "I think I said that, yes," responded Ms. Rice. Let's hope she felt at least a little shame.