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Egypt takes on defending champs Argentina on Tuesday

A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:

Today in World Cup play, defending champions Argentina take on Egypt, a team that hasn’t made it to the round of 16 in the World Cup since 1934. The Pharaohs’ unexpected run this year is lighting up the Arab world and, as their coach hopes, putting the plight of Palestinians in the spotlight as well. Here’s NPR’s Carrie Kahn.

CARRIE KAHN, BYLINE: After Egypt advanced, beating Australia in penalties last Friday, celebrations erupted, with parties posted all over social media…

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST: (Vocalizing).

KAHN: …From the glitzy streets of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to Dubai.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

UNIDENTIFIED SOCCER FAN #1: (Chanting in Arabic).

UNIDENTIFIED SOCCER FAN #2: (Vocalizing).

KAHN: World Cup fever is on.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken).

KAHN: At this cafe in Cairo’s historic Heliopolis neighborhood, hot drinks and shisha pipes are bubbling as the packed crowd watches Sunday night’s Brazil-Norway game. Ahmed Khair (ph), a 29-year-old engineer, says just making it into the World Cup has been an amazing achievement for Egypt.

AHMED KHAIR: (Speaking Arabic).

KAHN: “We came into the Cup really without a lot of expectations. We had no idea how far we’d go,” he says. “While Argentina may have Messi, we have Mohamed ‘Mo’ Salah” – the team’s star forward – “and then there’s our beloved coach,” says Khair.

KHAIR: (Speaking Arabic).

KAHN: “They all give us hope. They all care about the team so much. We can beat Argentina and make it all the way to the semifinals,” he says.

Along with hopes, Egypt’s coach, Hossam Hassan, has been making headlines. After securing a spot in the round of 16, Hassan unfurled the Palestinian flag. The Palestine Football Association is a FIFA member, so its flags are allowed on the field, despite prohibitions on political symbols. Yesterday, Hassan pressed his case again for the Palestinian cause at a FIFA presser.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

HOSSAM HASSAN: (Speaking Arabic).

KAHN: “My message through football – the world’s soft power – I beg you, whatever your religion, whatever country, my message is let the Palestinian people live. Just let them live,” he said.

(SOUNDBITE OF WHISTLE BLOWING)

KAHN: Hassan’s embrace of Palestinians was heard and appreciated in Gaza, says 23-year-old Osama Farahat (ph), walking amongst the rubble in Gaza City, sporting the Egyptian team’s red football jersey.

OSAMA FARAHAT: (Speaking Arabic).

KAHN: “We are waiting on pins and needles for this next match. It will be such a time of joy for us,” he says, “where we won’t think of our displacement, our hunger or our pain – just joy.”

With Ahmed Abu Hamda in Cairo and Anas Baba in Gaza, Carrie Kahn, NPR News, Tel Aviv. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

Carrie Kahn is NPR's International Correspondent based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Kahn's reports can be heard on NPR's award-winning news programs including All Things Considered, Morning Edition and Weekend Edition, and on NPR.org.

Previously, she spent a decade based in Mexico City, Mexico, covering Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America. She arrived in Mexico in the summer of 2012, on the eve of the election of President Enrique Peña Nieto and the PRI party's return to power, and reported on everything from the rise in violence throughout the country to its powerful drug cartels, and the arrest, escape and re-arrest of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. She reported on the Trump Administration's immigration policies and their effects on Mexico and Central America, the increasing international migration through the hemisphere, gang violence in Central America and the historic détente between the Obama Administration and Cuba.

Kahn has brought moving, personal stories to the forefront of NPR's coverage of the region. Some of her most notable coverage includes the stories of a Mexican man who was kidnapped and forced to dig a cross-border tunnel from Tijuana into San Diego, a Guatemalan family torn apart by President Trump's family separation policies and a Haitian family's situation immediately following the 2010 earthquake and on the ten-year anniversary of the disaster.

Prior to her post in Mexico, Kahn was a National Correspondent based in Los Angeles. She was the first NPR reporter into Haiti after the devastating earthquake in early 2010, and returned to the country on numerous occasions to continue NPR's coverage of the Caribbean nation. In 2005, Kahn was part of NPR's extensive coverage of Hurricane Katrina, where she investigated claims of euthanasia in New Orleans hospitals, recovery efforts along the Gulf Coast and resettlement of city residents in Houston, Texas.

She has covered hurricanes, the controversial life and death of pop icon Michael Jackson and firestorms and mudslides in Southern California,. In 2008, as China hosted the world's athletes, Kahn recorded a remembrance of her Jewish grandfather and his decision to compete in Hitler's 1936 Olympics.

Before coming to NPR in 2003, Kahn worked for NPR Member stations KQED and KPBS in California, with reporting focused on immigration and the U.S.-Mexico border.

Kahn is a recipient of the 2020 Cabot Prize from Columbia Journalism School, which honors distinguished reporting on Latin America and the Caribbean. In 2010 she was awarded the Headliner Award for Best in Show and Best Investigative Story for her work covering U.S. informants involved in the Mexican Drug War. Kahn's work has been cited for fairness and balance by the Poynter Institute of Media Studies. She was awarded and completed a Pew Fellowship in International Journalism at Johns Hopkins University.

Kahn received a bachelor's degree in biology from UC Santa Cruz. For several years, she was a human genetics researcher in California and in Costa Rica. She has traveled extensively throughout Mexico, Central America, Europe and the Middle East, where she worked on an English/Hebrew/Arabic magazine.

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