Richard Engel

Richard Engel (born September 16, 1973) is an American journalist and author who is the chief foreign correspondent for NBC News.

He graduated from Stanford in 1996 with a B.A. in international relations.

After graduating from Stanford, Engel left for Cairo, feeling the region was where the next big story would erupt.

He attributed his attraction to journalism as "the prospect of learning about new subjects and having the privilege of riding the train of history rather than watching it pass".

He first lived in a ramshackle seven-story walk-up, learned Egyptian Arabic and worked as a freelance reporter in Cairo for four years.

Engel worked as the Middle East correspondent for The World, a joint production of BBC World Service, Public Radio International (PRI) and WGBH from 2001 to 2003.

He also reported for USA Today, Reuters, AFP and Jane's Defence Weekly.

Engel worked for ABC News as a freelance journalist during the initial invasion of Iraq by U.S. forces.

Engel continued his coverage of the Iraq war in Baghdad as NBC's primary Iraq correspondent.

Before joining NBC in May 2003, Engel reported on the start of the 2003 war in Iraq for ABC News as a freelance journalist in Baghdad.

Engel is known for having covered the Iraq War, the Arab Spring and the Syrian Civil War.

He speaks and reads Arabic fluently and is fluent in Italian and Spanish.

Engel received the Medill Medal for Courage in Journalism for his report "War Zone Diary".

Engel wrote A Fist in the Hornet's Nest, published in 2004, about his experience covering the Iraq War from Baghdad.

In May 2006, he assumed his role as senior Middle East correspondent and Beirut bureau chief.

During this time he covered the war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

He filed a number of reports from Lebanon during the 2006 Lebanon War.

He was assigned to that position on April 18, 2008, after serving as the network's Middle East correspondent and Beirut bureau chief.

In April 2008, Engel became Chief Foreign Correspondent of NBC News.

In May 2008, he interviewed U.S. President George W. Bush, largely about his speech to the Israeli Knesset.

The interview also focused on Iran's empowerment as a result of the war in Iraq and how to counteract Iran's influence in the region.

In 2009, Engel was stationed in Kabul, Afghanistan, covering the country's August presidential election.

In 2011, Engel reported, at times through tear gas, on the Egyptian revolution.

He also covered the Libyan Civil War, where he was nearly shot in Benghazi.

The same year he toured and reported on the city of Mogadishu, Somalia, for a segment titled "The World's Most Dangerous City", for which he would receive a News and Documentary Emmy Award nomination.

Engel reported on the Israel-Gaza conflict of 2012, the continued violence stemming from the revolution in Syria and its consequent civil war, and the political transition of Egypt following the election of President Mohamed Morsi in June 2012.

His most recent book, And Then All Hell Broke Loose, published in 2016, is about his two-decade career in the Middle East as a freelance reporter.

Engel grew up on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, New York City.

His older brother, David, is a cardiologist at New York–Presbyterian Hospital.

His father Peter, a former Goldman Sachs financier, and mother Nina, who ran an antiques store, feared for their son's future prospects because of his dyslexia.

His father is Jewish, and his mother is Swedish.

Engel attended the Riverdale Country School, a highly competitive college-prep school in New York City, where at first he struggled with his schoolwork and progress.

At age 13, he joined a wilderness survival camp where he learned about leadership and how to be more independent.

His schoolwork began to improve and he started to gain popularity with his peers.

He then spent his junior year of high school in Italy and became fluent in Italian.

Engel began to appreciate the difference in cultures and countries that influenced his future career choices.

He later went to Stanford University, where he occasionally wrote for The Stanford Daily.

Engel spent one summer as an unpaid intern at CNN Business News in New York City.

Engel is the host of the MSNBC special series On Assignment with Richard Engel, which won a 2019 Peabody Award.

Engel's latest documentary, Ukraine: Freedom or Death aired on April 22, 2022, and covered the first two months of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.