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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Latest on the GOP megabill now before the House, forecasters say tax cut and spending bill would add trillions to U.S. debt, Sean Combs found guilty on 2 counts but acquitted on most serious charges.
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Sean Combs was found guilty on two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution, but on the more serious charges of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking the jury found him not guilty.
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GOP megabill heads back to the House after Senate approval, what the tax and spending bill means for people on Medicaid, Trump administration to slash ATF budget and ease gun regulations.
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President Trump says Israel has agreed to a 60-day ceasefire in Gaza and urged Hamas to accept it. This comes ahead of a Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to the White House next week.
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Senate Republicans closing in on final vote on GOP spending bill, new poll finds about three-quarters of Americans say democracy under serious threat, USAID officially shuts down Tuesday.
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When the Trump administration took over, one of its first major moves was dismantling the United States Agency for International Development. Nearly six months later, it officially shuts down Tuesday.
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New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani discusses his vision for the city and his surprise win in last week's Democratic primary on Morning Edition. -
Senate moves ahead on massive tax and spending bill, Russia launches record aerial attack on Ukraine over the weekend, a man started a blaze in Idaho then ambushed and fatally shot 2 firefighters.
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The University of Virginia's President resigned under pressure from the Trump administration. Leila Fadel asks Professor Brenden Cantwell at Michigan State about the impact on public higher education.
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NPR's Leila Fadel speaks with Aitor Zabalgogeazkoa, an emergency coordinator with Doctors Without Borders in Gaza, who explains why his organization is calling for the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation aid distribution system to be dismantled.
