Fulfilling a 'Shared Dream' in Baghdad

By: Hannah Allam, the former Baghdad bureau chief for Knight Ridder who now handles the Cairo bureau for McClatchy, offered this e-mailed comment on Fadel.



I first met Leila when I was assigned to be her mentor during her internship at the St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press. She was soft-spoken, but had this quiet determination about her. She and I immediately became close friends, especially because we had parallel upbringings: Arab fathers, American mothers, and we both grew up in oil towns in Saudi Arabia. After work in Minnesota, we would go out for dinner and talk about our shared dream: to report on the Middle East one day.

Fast forward four years. Leila and I still cherish our late-night talks, but now they take place on the Nile or the Tigris instead of the Mississippi. We still can't believe it.

The shy intern I mentored in Minneapolis has morphed into a smart, confident manager who is now my own mentor and sounding board. She runs a tight ship in Baghdad, producing smart, unique stories that offer a peek into the lives of Iraqis and Americans who are struggling to contain the violence. Her background as an Arab-American Muslim certainly helps with access and sources, but that wouldn't amount to much if she didn't also bring sharp news judgment and a Puritan work ethic.

When she was named bureau chief, many of our Iraqi staff members rejoiced. After two Sunni Muslim bureau chiefs (Nancy Youssef and me), a Shiite Muslim had arrived and tipped the sectarian balance. The Sunni-Shiite tension that gets people killed in Baghdad was a source of good-natured ribbing and laughter in our bureau. She's worked hard to make sure the coverage is balanced and fair. She has a zero-tolerance policy for sectarianism in the workplace, and the Iraqi staff respects her for her even-handedness. Now if we can just get her to stop driving through Anbar province to Jordan, we'd all sleep better at night.

Leila even manages to make the oven work when there is no electricity. She also has the best shimmy of any belly dancer I've ever seen. She eschews body armor in favor of a simple black scarf and robe ? that way, she's able to blend in with Iraqis and take our readers to places other reporters can't. Her only other "armor": a fake gold wedding ring to fend off the advances of smarmy Iraqi officials.