Nader Talebzadeh

Nader Talebzadeh (Persian: نادر طالب‌زاده) also known as Nader Ordoubadi was an Iranian conservative journalist and filmmaker.[2]

Nader Talebzadeh Ordoubadi
Born
Nader-Gholi Talebzadeh Ordoubadi[1]

c. 1953/1954
Tehran, Iran
Died29 April 2022 (aged 68)
Tehran, Iran
Other namesNader Ordoubadi
Years active1979–2022
Notable workThe Messiah
TelevisionIslamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting
Spouse(s)Randi Hoffman, Azam Bagheri,Zeinab Mehanna
Parents
  • Mansour Talebzadeh Ordoubadi (father)
  • Marie Ordoubadi (mother)
Relatives
  • Noah Mckay (brother)
  • Nini Ordoubadi (sister)

Early life

Talebzadeh was born in 1953[2] or 1954 in Tehran.[3] His father Mansour Talebzadeh Ordoubadi, was a general officer serving in the Imperial Iranian Army. Several sources claimed that his father was instrumental in 1953 Iranian coup d'état, overthrowing Mohammad Mosaddegh, a claim which Talebzadeh always denied during his lifetime. Talebzadeh himself told Iranian news sources that his mother was Seyyedeh Vahideh Amir Molouk Sharafi a descendant of Ayatollah Sharafolaali Isfahani.[4] Nasser Talebzadeh (Noah Mckay)'s funeral lists his mother as Marie Ordoubadi.[5] The couple had two other children. Talebzadeh's brother, Nasser Ordoubadi also known as Noah A. McKay, was a medical doctor. His sister, Nini Ordoubadi[5] lives in a barn located in East Meredith, New York with her husband Anthony Chase, and owns a tea shop named Tay Tea.[6][7]

Talebzadeh immigrated to the United States in 1970[8] and lived in the state of Virginia.[9] Talebzadeh told the Los Angeles Times in 2008 that he studied at the American University.[8] Afterwards, he studied cinema at Now York City's Columbia University.[10]

Career

Talebzadeh returned to Iran after in 1979 to film the Iranian Revolution.[10] He became a fixer for American media in Tehran due to his command in English language and his earlier experiences, working closely with the crew of CBS News, which at the time had about thirty to forty personnel stationed in Iran.[10] He also established contacts in the National Radio and Television, as well as the Ministry of National Guidance.[10] According to Hamid Naficy, Talebzadeh left CBS after he became disillusioned with media portrayal of the revolution by Western outlets.[10]

Using his connections, he then made a 35-minute documentary named Vaqeiyat (lit. 'Reality') about Western bias on covering the hostage crisis, which included using juxtaposition technique to mix interviews he had made with foreign correspondents covering Iran and reports aired by their media.[10]

During the 1990s he irregularly contributed to Sobh, an anti-intellectual publiction edited by Mohammad Nassiri.[11]

Conference organizing

Talebzadeh was a key organizer of several controversial conferences, including the International Conference to Review the Global Vision of the Holocaust (2006), the International Conference on Hollywoodism (2011–2013) and the New Horizon Conference (2013–2019).

U.S. federal government accused Talebzadeh of working closely with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and traveling across the world to recruit assets for the Quds Force under cover of inviting guests to conferences.[12] Talebzadeh denied allegations of providing the IRGC with information.[13] He was nonetheless put on the sanctions list by the U.S. Department of the Treasury in 2019 for "supporting intelligence and cyber targeting of U.S. persons".[3]

According to George Michael, Talebzadeh introduced his personal friend Michael Collins Piper to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the two met on the sidelines of a press conference in the New York City after the latter's speech at the United Nations.[14] Piper was then invited to Iran by Ahmadinejad and participated in International Conference to Review the Global Vision of the Holocaust in 2006.[14] Other figures personally in touch with Talebzadeh include Aleksandr Dugin,[13] Ibrahim Mousawi,[13] Louis Farrakhan and Catherine Perez-Shakdam.

Partial filmography
  • Vaqeiyat (lit. 'Reality', 1979)[10]
  • Zaban-e Hal (lit. 'The Expression of Feeling', 1980s)[15]
  • Khanjar va Shaqayeq (lit. 'Dagger and Poppy', 1992), documentary series about the Bosnian War[16]
  • The Messiah (2007)[17]
  • I Was There (2008), a 9/11 conspiracy documentary[18]
  • Secret, a show on state television[19]

Personal life

According to John Gaffney, a classmate and friend of Talebzadeh at the Columbia University, Talebzadeh had a partially deaf girlfriend from Chicago named Randi Hoffman.[20] New York public marriage license data show that Talebzadeh married Hoffman during the time he spent in United States.[21] According to Hoffman's twitter page, she later accompanied him back and spent time in Iran acting as a journalist for CBS news.[22] Talebzadeh later married twice, first to Azam Bagheri, and later in life to Zeinab Mehanna, a Lebanese woman.[3]

Views

Talebzadeh was politically a conservative[2] and co-founder of the Popular Front of Islamic Revolution Forces.[23] He was staunchly against Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and technocratic policies of his administration.[11]

Though described as a proponent of anti-Americanism, it has been claimed that he held American citizenship.[2] In 2013, Thomas Erdbrink who served as bureau chief for The New York Times in Tehran, referred to him as an "Iranian-American".[19]

References
  1. "Conference Programme" (PDF). easaonline.org. Retrieved 15 October 2023.
  2. Mirsepassi, Ali (2017), Transnationalism in Iranian Political Thought: The Life and Times of Ahmad Fardid, Cambridge University Press, p. 372, ISBN 9781107187290
  3. Treasury Sanctions Iranian Organizations and Individuals Supporting Intelligence and Cyber Targeting of U.S. Persons, U.S. Department of the Treasury, 13 February 2019
  4. "پرده برداری از ناگفته‌های زندگی "نادر طالب‌زاده" برای اولین بار/پدر من در زمان کودتای 28 مرداد اصلاً در تهران نبود".
  5. "Obituary: Noah A. McKay M.D.", The Seattle Times, 19 February 2009, retrieved 26 December 2016
  6. Cohen, Billie (9 November 2007), "The Square Footage Out Back", The New York Times, retrieved 26 December 2016
  7. "About Our Gourmet Tea Company in Andes, NY".
  8. Fleishman, Jeffrey (29 April 2008). "Jesus through the lens of Islam". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 19 July 2021. In 1970, he moved to the United States, where he says he studied at American University in Washington, D.C., and Columbia University in New York.
  9. Young, Deborah (13 February 2005). "'Messiah' has Islamic take on Jesus". Variety. Retrieved 11 February 2016. A film teacher who studied cinema at Columbia U. in the 1970s.
  10. Naficy, Hamid (2012). A Social History of Iranian Cinema. Vol. 3: The Islamicate Period, 1978–1984. Duke University Press. p. 64. ISBN 978-0822348771.
  11. Mirsepassi, Ali (2017), Transnationalism in Iranian Political Thought: The Life and Times of Ahmad Fardid, Cambridge University Press, pp. 296–297, ISBN 9781107187290
  12. "Who Runs Iran's Propaganda Machine Abroad". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. 17 April 2020. Retrieved 25 April 2021.
  13. Porter, Lizzie (24 October 2019). "What sanctions? An Iranian conference in Beirut just happened". Atlantic Council. Retrieved 26 December 2019.
  14. Michael, George (2011), "The Strategic Use of Holocaust Denial", in Horowitz, Irving Louis (ed.), Culture and Civilization, vol. 1, Transaction Publishers, pp. 239–240, ISBN 9781412813495
  15. Reipour, Bahram, ed. (1988), Iranian Cinema, 1985-1988, Fardin Press House, p. 335
  16. Abbasian, Kaveh (6 July 2021). "The Next Battlefield for Iran's Generals is the Movies". New Lines Magazine. Retrieved 15 October 2023.
  17. "Lebanese Christians angered by TV show about Christ". BBC News. 13 August 2010. Retrieved 11 February 2016.
  18. "A view of forbidden territory", The Sydney Morning Herald, 15 May 2008
  19. Erdbrink, Thomas (18 February 2013), "Stung by 'Argo,' Iran Backs Conference Denouncing 'Hollywoodism'", The New York Times, retrieved 26 December 2016
  20. Gaffney, John (2019), The Trap of Love, Page Publishing Inc, pp. 1–2, ISBN 9781645842330
  21. "Ancestry Join".
  22. "گزارشی درباره همسر یهودی مرحوم نادر طالب زاده + اسناد". دیدبان ایران (in Persian). Retrieved 21 August 2022.
  23. "Popular Front of the Islamic Revolution comes into existence". Tehran Times. 26 December 2016. Retrieved 26 December 2016.
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