Leila Fadel
Leila Fadel is a national correspondent for NPR based in Los Angeles, covering issues of culture, diversity, and race.
Most recently, she was NPR's international correspondent based in Cairo and covered the wave of revolts in the Middle East and their aftermaths in Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, and beyond. Her stories brought us to the heart of a state-ordered massacre of pro-Muslim Brotherhood protesters in Cairo in 2013 when police shot into crowds of people to clear them and killed between 1,000 and 2,000 people. She told us the tales of a coup in Egypt and what it is like for a country to go through a military overthrow of an elected government. She covered the fall of Mosul to ISIS in 2014 and documented the harrowing tales of the Yazidi women who were kidnapped and enslaved by the group. Her coverage also included stories of human smugglers in Egypt and the Syrian families desperate and willing to pay to risk their lives and cross a turbulent ocean for Europe.
She was awarded the Lowell Thomas Award from the Overseas Press Club for her coverage of the 2013 coup in Egypt and the toll it took on the country and Egyptian families. In 2017 she earned a Gracie award for the story of a single mother in Tunisia whose two eldest daughters were brainwashed and joined ISIS. The mother was fighting to make sure it didn't happen to her younger girls.
Before joining NPR, she covered the Middle East for The Washington Post as the Cairo Bureau Chief. Prior to her position as Cairo Bureau Chief for the Post, she covered the Iraq war for nearly five years with Knight Ridder, McClatchy Newspapers, and later the Washington Post. Her foreign coverage of the devastating human toll of the Iraq war earned her the George. R. Polk award in 2007. In 2016 she was the Council on Foreign Relations Edward R. Murrow fellow.
Leila Fadel is a Lebanese-American journalist who speaks conversational Arabic and was raised in Saudi Arabia and Lebanon.
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While President Biden was addressing Congress, his message was also for people watching at home — voters whose support he will need to secure a run for a second term.
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The death toll continues to climb in Turkey and Syria after Monday's catastrophic earthquake. Rescue teams have worked around the clock, against freezing temperatures, trying to find survivors.
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Takeaways from President Biden's State of the Union speech. Rescue efforts continue in Turkey and Syria following Monday's massive earthquake. And, LeBron James breaks the NBA career scoring record.
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Beyonce tickets are on sale, but after the Taylor Swift debacle there are questions about whether Ticketmaster is up to the challenges.
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Emergency workers search for earthquake survivors in Turkey, President Biden tonight gives his State of the Union address and Ohio averts a catastrophe after chemical-filled train cars derailed.
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The State Department announced Secretary of State Antony Blinken will not go ahead with a planned trip to China, after the surveillance balloon was detected over U.S. airspace Thursday.
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Secretary of State Antony Blinken will be the first Cabinet secretary in the Biden Administration to visit China. His trip this weekend comes as tensions between the U.S. and China continue to boil.
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The U.S. job market remains tight, with unemployment at or near a half-century low. The Labor Department reports Friday morning on job gains for the month of January.
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Chinese surveillance balloon, spotted over the U.S., complicates Antony Blinken's trip to China, a Guantánamo prisoner is released to Belize, report says Great Salt Lake is at risk of drying up.
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A prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba, who sued the Biden administration for unlawful imprisonment, has been released, and is now living in Belize.