Hateful down to her shoes, Bella Hadid pushes Adidas sneaks from bloody ‘72 Olympics

What was the most memorable moment of the Munich Summer Olympics of 1972?

For most people — not just Jews — those games are recalled with horror as the Munich Massacre.

Ten days after the opening ceremonies, members of the Palestinian terrorist group Black September murdered 11 Israeli athletes and coaches.

After slipping into their apartment, the terrorists took nine hostages and killed wrestling coach Moshe Weinberg and weightlifter Yossef Romano, who fought back against the attackers.

The games went on, but the world’s press shifted to cover the hostage crisis — the first time a terrorist incident reached a global audience on live TV.

Viewers watched in fear as the German authorities bungled a rescue attempt.

Finally, the terrorists slaughtered their hostages in cold blood.

Horrified audiences heard ABC sportscaster Jim McKay announce the news: “They’re all gone.”

A new form of global conflict was born, as terrorists learned that news coverage increased the power and potency of their crimes.

Nobody in their right mind would feel nostalgia for the 1972 Olympics. There are no happy memories from those games.

And yet, the apparel company Adidas has decided in the runup to the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris to reintroduce its 1972 Olympic sneakers, launching an advertising campaign to promote the retro throwback shoes.

And none other than Bella Hadid, a model who has made headlines for her outspoken defense of Hamas on social media, was chosen as the kicks’ ambassador.

Honestly, it was perhaps the perfect fit for a company founded by a Nazi.

Adolf (“Adi”) Dassler, a former member of the Nazi Party, formed Adidas in Germany in the aftermath of World War II.

But prior to that, Dassler made sports shoes that were embraced by Adolf Hitler, author Andrew Lapin has explained.

“During the infamous 1936 Berlin Olympic games, orchestrated by Hitler in an attempt to demonstrate Aryan athletic supremacy on the world stage, many of the German athletes sported Dassler shoes,” Lapin wrote.

Ironically, the Munich games of 1972 were meant to cleanse the memory of Berlin 1936.

Nearly three decades after the Holocaust, West German authorities had worked hard to distance themselves from the country’s Nazi past.

Yet today, a company that made its name at the 1936 Games is feeling nostalgic about the Olympics where Israelis were kidnapped and murdered for the crime of being Jews.

Adidas’ partnership with Hadid is perhaps as fitting as the one Adidas shared with another famous antisemitic spokesman, Kanye West.

Just a few years ago, it took six days for Adidas to break its ties with West after he boasted on a podcast, “I can literally say antisemitic s–t and they cannot drop me.”

Hadid’s well-documented eagerness to parrot Hamas’ talking points long predated Adidas’ partnership with the model.

She has repeatedly run PR propaganda for the terrorists still holding 120 souls hostage in Gaza, including eight Americans and two toddlers.

Last month, following the heroic rescue of four Israeli hostages, Hadid posted a photo of former captive Almog Meir Jan, who survived for eight months on meager rations of pita bread.

As a form of psychological torture, Hamas delivered him a cake on his birthday, reminding him that he was spending this milestone in literal chains.

Her post praised Hamas for making Meir Jan that cake — neglecting to mention the beatings and torture he endured.

In 2021, Hadid shared a graphic asserting that Israel was not a country but a land settled by colonizers.

She deleted the post amid criticism — and in its place shared a video of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) saying, “It is not antisemitic to be critical of a right-wing government in Israel.”

But Hadid wasn’t being critical of the government of Israel — she was being critical of the existence of the Jewish state itself.

In her mind, and in the minds of antisemites like her, Israel should not exist, and has no right to rescue its citizens taken hostage on Oct. 7, the most deadly day for Jews since the Holocaust.

Adidas’ “decision continues to raise serious concerns about the company’s commitment to moving on from their Nazi roots,” the organization StopAntisemitism told me.

On Thursday, following an initial burst of criticism, Adidas tried to backtrack on Hadid’s hiring.

“We are conscious that connections have been made to tragic historical events — though these are completely unintentional,” the company announced, saying it would “revise” its ad campaign. Adidas did not clarify what that revision would entail.

Hadid and Adidas deserve each other.

And loud and proud antisemites have a new shoe to proclaim their Jew-hatred, in bright red — perfectly matching the Jewish blood that ran through the streets of Munich in 1972.

Retro indeed.

Bethany Mandel is the co-author of “Stolen Youth” and a homeschooling mother of six based in greater Washington, DC.