Lila Hassan is an award-winning independent journalist who focuses on extremism, human rights, and immigration. After five years working in human rights investigations and documentation, she pivoted to journalism and has reported from Cairo, Istanbul, Paris, and New York.
A multimedia reporter and researcher, Hassan has contributed to investigative and enterprise documentaries and podcasts that have gone on to win Polk Awards, become a DuPont finalist, and be nominated for a Peabody Award and Emmy. Hassan also contributed two stories to a package of work in The New York Times on U.S. airstrikes in Iraq and Syria that won the Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting (2022).
In June 2024, Hassan co-won the prestigious Livingston Award for national reporting, honoring work she had done on season 4 of Bodies, a podcast exploring medical mysteries using a human-first storytelling approach. She had previously been part of a package that won a Bronze prize of the 2020 Third Coast Competition for the same series.
Her work has appeared in The Nation, Mother Jones, Wired, The Intercept, FRONTLINE PBS, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Reuters, The Guardian, ProPublica, HuffPost National, Kaiser Health News, and more. She has covered issues ranging from protest crackdowns in Istanbul, countries’ inaction to repatriate citizens who joined ISIS from camps in Syria and Iraq, as well as ghost guns and online far-right extremism radicalization (see some reporting here). Her work has been supported by The International Women's Media Foundation, Type Media Center, The Fund for Investigative Journalism, and a Silver Grants from the Robert B. Silvers Foundation.
Hassan taught local reporting as an adjunct at Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, where she was also previously an associate of Columbia Graduate School of Journalism’s Simon and June Li Center for Global Journalism, where she served as a course aide to the school’s conflict reporting course.
Hassan has also been the acting research editor at Insider's investigation desk, where she oversaw the fact-checking operation and offered various teams guidnance on research and editorial standards.
She has served on the jury for the James Foley Conflict Reporting Award (2021, 2022) and regularly engages in discussion about the importance of growing diversity within journalism (see appearances). She has also served on the fundraising and event planning committees of the Arab and Middle Eastern Journalist Association (AMEJA).
She holds an M.S. from Columbia Journalism School’s specialized Toni Stabile investigative program, where she was a Lorana Sullivan fellow. She holds a B.A. in political science with honors from CUNY Brooklyn College, where she was a Scholars Program student. She has also studied international affairs and law at Université de Paris X - Nanterre.
Hassan speaks Arabic (bilingual) and French (professional fluency), and is working on her Spanish. Language learning recommendations are welcome.
Photo: Cardieri Photography
Copyright © 2024 Lila Hassan - All Rights Reserved.
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