Yesterday, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak telephoned Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to insist that he “stop the Israeli aggression” and end the blockade at the Gaza border crossing. Today, Israel reopened the border to allow humanitarian aid and fuel shipments to pass through.

Egypt, meanwhile, kept its border with Gaza closed, prompting a protest at the Rafah crossing to turn violent. In case you missed it, the Associated Press posted a story this afternoon for a little more than an hour titled, “Clashes Erupt at Gaza-Egypt Border.” According to the report,

Ten Egyptian police and about 60 protesters were hurt as protesters hurled stones at the Egyptians and Palestinian gunmen fired briefly in the air. Hundreds of protesters briefly broke through the border terminal, pushing back helmeted Egyptian riot police who fired in the air to try to contain the crowd.The clash came at the end of a protest of several thousand women carrying Hamas flags and calling for a lifting of the full closure of Gaza imposed by Israel last week. The protesters hurled insults at Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.”Hosni Mubarak you are a coward, you are an agent for the Americans,” they chanted. “Gaza women will not be humiliated.”

By mid-afternoon, the ap story about Egyptian riot police injuring 60 protesters, most of them women, had been revised. They changed the title to “Israel eases blockade; scuffles between Gaza protesters and Egypt guards.” The revised text also omitted everything about Gaza women.

The original version of the article explained the reasoning behind Egypt closing its border this way:

Since Hamas violently took over Gaza in June, Egypt has joined Israel in severely restricting access to Gaza, largely keeping its border terminal closed. Egypt is concerned about a spillover of Hamas-style militancy into its territory.

Egypt has had its border with Gaza closed since June (except to weapons smugglers) in order to protect itself from Hamas. In the ap revision, they omitted the point about the border being closed for the past seven months.

Let’s review: Israel closed its border for four days in response to a barrage of 220 rockets Hamas fired upon the western Negev last week. After intense international pressure, it reopened the border this morning. Here is how the United Nation’s John Ging, stationed in Gaza, responded to Israel’s four-day blockade:

The firing of rockets (by Palestinians) is wholly and totally unacceptable. The response to that cannot be a retaliation, collectively punishing a civilian population on this side of the crossing, which is also trapped and a victim to the conflict.

The international community’s position is this: Israel certainly cannot occupy Gaza. It can’t retaliate to missile attacks from Gaza. And it must continue supplying Gaza with electricity, fuel, food and humanitarian aid.

Hosni Mubarak, of course, can turn a blind eye to weapons leaving Egypt for Gaza, dispatch riot police to forcefully rebuff anyone, including women, attempting to flee Gaza for Egypt, audaciously censure Israel for not doing enough to help Palestinians, and the international community will jump through hoops in order to give him a free pass.

Once in awhile, a major newsmedia reporter will stumble over the truth and momentarily get it right. But then, with a gentle nudge from agenda-driven editors, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, they usually pick themselves up and hurry on as if nothing happened.