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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Immigration attorney Linette Tobin shares details with NPR about the government's case against her client, Jerce Reyes Barrios, a Venezuelan soccer player and father of two. -
Leila Fadel speaks with Congressman Jim Himes (D-Conn.) ahead of a hearing on the Trump administration's inadvertent disclosure of war plans on messaging app Signal. -
National Security officials are grilled over their use of Signal, Federal workers ordered back to office find shortages of supplies, Russia and Ukraine agree to stop fighting in the Black Sea.
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The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development says it is partnering with Homeland Security to help identify immigrants without legal status living in publicly subsidized housing.
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The private messaging Signal is not a secure government network but it is used by many government officials and journalists. NPR's Leila Fadel talks with Matt Blaze, cybersecurity expert and professor at Georgetown University Law Center, about security features on Signal.
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The White House is confirming a stunning security breach. NPR's Leila Fadel speaks with former State Department spokesperson Ned Price about how a journalist was included in a group chat with U.S. officials discussing airstrikes in Yemen, on a publicly available messaging app.
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President Trump has suggested that the U.S. should take over Greenland. Now, a planned trip to Greenland puts Usha Vance, the spouse of the U.S. vice president, in a difficult diplomatic position.
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The Trump administration received pointed questions from a judge on the use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport scores of alleged members of a gang with no due process.
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The White House confirmed what appears to be an extraordinary breach of security. A journalist was included in a group chat with U.S. officials discussing plans to strike Houthi rebels in Yemen.
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Texting war plans on Signal to a journalist, Trump faces legal challenges over his use of the Alien Enemies Act, a planned visit to Greenland by the U.S. second lady raises eyebrows.
