Classic SL 72 sneaker ad featuring Palestinian supermodel Bella Hadid.
German sports brand Adidas decided to replace the model who cast Palestinian-American model Bella Hadid in a shoe advertisement due to backlash from Israel.
According to Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) and other newspapers on the 20th (local time), Adidas recently re-released its classic "SL72" sneakers ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympics. The SL72 is the sneaker that Adidas released at the 1972 Munich Olympics.
The sneaker advertisement shows Hadid walking up to the podium wearing a uniform in the colors of the Israeli flag. There is also a scene where an Arab man holds up a black bouquet of flowers with his left hand.
In the 1972 Munich Olympics, 11 Israeli athletes were killed in a terrorist attack by the Palestinian group Black September. Adidas is interpreted to have highlighted this incident when it released its SL72 advertisement. In relation to this, the Israeli side protested whether it was appropriate to use Hadid, who is of Palestinian descent, as a model while re-releasing a product with this context.
Hadid also participated in a protest when former US President Donald Trump officially announced Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in 2017. In 2020, she posted a photo of her father's passport on Instagram with the caption "Born in Palestine," and then protested when it was deleted. Her father was a Palestinian real estate developer and her mother was a Dutch model.
When the advertisement was released, the Israeli embassy in Germany criticized it on the X (Twitter) account, saying, "Hadid and her father often spread anti-Semitic slander and conspiracies. Does Adidas have anything more to say?"
The American Jewish Committee, a pro-Israel group, also called it “Adidas’s anachronistic advertising campaign.” Adidas responded to the criticism by issuing a statement saying, “While it was completely unintentional, we recognize that the ad was connected to a tragic historical event, and we apologize for any upset or pain this may have caused.” 토토사이트
Sign in to leave a comment.