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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A judge has thrown out six counts in the Georgia election interference case involving former President Donald Trump and 14 others.
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Michigan faith leader Rev. Kenneth Flowers says President Biden should not take the Black vote for granted.
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President Biden delivers State of the Union address Thursday night. Alabama's governor signs IVF bill giving immunity to patients and providers. Thursday marks five months since Hamas attacked Israel
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In vitro fertilization providers in Alabama are expected to resume services as soon as Thursday after the new law ends nearly three weeks of limbo for both IVF providers and the families they serve.
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Some Arab American, Muslim and young voters in the Detroit area plan to vote "uncommitted" in Tuesday's primary. They want to send a message to Biden: Call for a cease-fire or lose us in November.
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NPR's Leila Fadel talks to poet and author Omotara James about her collection which explores self-love in a Black, fat body. She is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee and a Lambda literary fellow.
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U.S. Supreme Court takes up an environmental case. Nikki Haley vows to stay in the race for the GOP presidential nomination. Alabama's Supreme Court gives fertilized eggs the same rights as children.
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WikiLeaks founder Assange's latest battle to avoid extradition to U.S. Egypt builds buffer in anticipation of a Palestinian refugee spillover. Louisiana's legislature begins special session on crime.
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Jennifer Lopez offers a companion to her 2002 album This Is Me...Then. On This Is Me...Now she is once again inspired by falling in love with Ben Affleck.
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The Oscar-nominated documentary Four Daughters tells the story of Olfa Hamrouni's two eldest daughters, who disappeared to join ISIS. NPR's Leila Fadel speaks with the director Kaouther Ben Hania.