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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Halloween is filled with tricks and treats, but it's also filled with land mines of cultural appropriation and racist tropes. When does holiday fun turn into an offense for someone else? -
More and more places in the United States are dropping Columbus Day in favor of Indigenous Peoples' Day, but the shift isn't happening without some pushback. -
The court will examine whether workplace discrimination protections extend to LGBTQ people — a ruling that will have widespread implications in more than 25 states without such safeguards. -
NPR's Leila Fadel first met Rosa Gutierrez Lopez in January, after she sought refuge at Cedar Lane Unitarian Universalist Church. If she leaves the property, she risks being deported to El Salvador. -
More than 2 million people call greater Las Vegas home, locals say visitors miss its hidden gems. Such as this night of entertainment — not your typical Vegas show. Proceeds go to area charities. -
Smithsonian researcher Anna Phillips led the recent discovery of the new medicinal species. Its superficial similarities to a North American leech species helped prevent its detection before. -
Mondays Dark is a show that's for Las Vegas, a city seen by many as a place to go crazy and then leave. The city's performers volunteer to entertain a local audience and raise money for charity.
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Director Issa López blends magical realism and horror with the current events of her native country in the story of young Estrella, who meets a street gang of fellow orphan children. -
Author Isabel Quintero and illustrator Zeke Peña worked together on My Papi Has a Motorcycle, a homage to Quintero's childhood in California's Inland Empire, and to her hard-working father. -
Even in retirement, the former Senate majority leader is calling to change the rules. Reid tells NPR the filibuster is obstructing the Senate from tackling big issues like climate change and gun laws.
