Top international anchors of Arab origin

Leila Fadel

Leila Fadel
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Updated 21 October 2021

Leila Fadel

Leila Fadel

Current occupation: Correspondent for NPR

Former employers: Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Knight Ridder, McClatchy, The Washington Post

Education: Northeastern University School of Journalism

Nationality: Lebanese-American

While Fadel is not an anchor, she is known for her extensive coverage of the Iraq War and the Arab Spring, and is currently a national correspondent for NPR currently covering issues of culture, diversity, and race. 

Prior to her posting in Los Angeles, Fadel was NPR’s international correspondent based in Cairo and covered the Arab Spring in the Middle East in Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, and beyond. 

Fadel started her career in journalism at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram as a crime and higher education reporter. She then extensively covered the Iraq war for almost five years with Knight Ridder, McClatchy Newspapers. 

Her coverage of the Iraq War earned her the George. R. Polk award in 2007.

Fadel’s experience in Iraq prompted her to cover the 2006 Lebanese war, and subsequently the Arab Spring revolts in 2011. 

That year, Fadel and photographer Linda Davidson were among some two dozen journalists arrested by the Egyptian Interior Ministry while covering the events in the country. The next day, Fadel and Davidson were released, but placed under house arrest at a hotel.

​​Just before joining NPR, Fadel covered the Middle East for The Washington Post as the Cairo Bureau Chief. 

She covered the fall of Mosul to Daesh 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 and Syrian families in Egypt.