MOSCOW, July 31 Adidas AG CEO Bjorn Gulden has apologized for a sneaker ad featuring American supermodel of Palestinian descent Bella Hadid, which sparked a wave of public criticism, the agency reports. Bloomberg.
«Adidas CEO apologizes for Bella Hadid campaign… Adidas AG made a mistake in its SL 72 sneaker campaign featuring Palestinian-American model Bella Hadid and is reviewing its actions to avoid similar missteps,» the agency said in a statement, citing Gulden. 
The company's CEO acknowledged a mistake in how the campaign «was put together» and said Adidas intends to «move on» after the apology.
The model had previously issued her own apology on social media for appearing in the ad, saying she was unaware of the connection between the shoes being advertised and the «violent events» at the 1972 Munich Olympics.
TMZ previously reported that Hadid was planning to sue Adidas «for lack of public accountability.»
Earlier, the German newspaper Berliner Zeitung reported that Adidas' collaboration with Hadid, in which she became the new face of a campaign for retro sneakers (the SL 72 OG series), was harshly criticized by the public. According to Berliner Zeitung, the shoes were originally designed for the 1972 Munich Olympics, during which a terrorist attack occurred on September 5: eleven Israeli athletes were killed by Palestinian terrorists. First, the American NGO StopAntisemitism expressed harsh criticism of the collaboration, then an indignant post appeared on the official account of the X State of Israel social network, noting that Hadid had previously spread anti-Semitism and incited violence against Israelis and Jews. 