Nationality America Years active 1979 - present Occupation Journalist | Citizenship Iran Ethnicity African American Name Mardhiah Hashemi | |
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Full Name Melanie Franklin Known for Host of Press TV, Mahjubah magazine | ||
vonpress exclusive interview with Mardhiah Hashemi
Marzieh Hashemi (Persian: مرضیه هاشمی; born Melanie Franklin) is an American-born Iranian journalist and television presenter. She is a correspondent in Press TV the editor-in-chief of Mahjubah magazine.
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Biography
Hashemi was born in New Orleans, United States. She was born in a Protestant Afro-American family. She was a student in the field of broadcasting in 1979, when the Iranian revolution happened, after which she worked for Islamic newspapers and magazines in U.S after converting to Islam.
Since 2008, she has lived Iran, where she is now a TV presenter, journalist, voice-over artist, and documentarian and the host of Press TV, Iran's English-language broadcasting network.
Conversion to Islam
According to Hashemi, the main cause to convert to Islam was the Iranian revolution and characteristic of Ruhollah Khomeini.
When I was a student in America I witnessed that the Iranian students are so active and I was so interested in political activities then, I used to ask them about their activities and purposes, why you protest? And they used to talk about the cruelty of the overset king and Imam Khomeini to me, and this was the first step of me becoming Muslim. I was looking for the truth and I wasn't satisfied with my own religion, and I had no solution for the problem that the God has three parts of the Father, and the Son, and the holy Spirit, But still where one? I wasn't convinced with answers when I asked from different people, when this issue happened to be in university, I started to study not only about Islam but about different religions, and simultaneously comparing them in theory and ideology, from Marx Weber up to now, and thanks God, after I became Muslim.
She changed her name to Mardhiah Hashemi when she became a Muslim; Hashemi is her Muslim husband’s last name and she choose Mardhiah because it is a title of Fatimah bint Muhammad, the daughter of Islamic Prophet.