Egypt: US officials backed rebels planning Egyptian uprising in 2008, says WikiLeaks

Even as they were officially supporting Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, American officials were secretly helping dissidents interested in using social media to overthrow his regime, a secret dispatch from the US embassy in Cairo has revealed. The cable, dated 30 December 2008 and recently released on the Wikileaks website, also describes a plot to oust Mr. Mubarak in 2011, which it dismisses as 'unrealistic'.