Facing mounting criticism from anti-Israel activists and groups, sportswear giant Adidas has issued an apology over an advertisement that featured a former IDF soldier.
Behind the controversy is the company's Single Shoe service, a global initiative that allows consumers and athletes who need only one shoe, such as amputees, to purchase a single shoe at half price. As part of the company's advertising campaign in Israel, Adidas chose Shalev Biton, an IDF veteran who lost his leg after a missile fired from Gaza into Israel struck the military vehicle he was in in 2021. Displayed across local Adidas outlets in Israel, the poster campaign placed Biton alongside ten other disabled athletes.
He lost his leg to a Hamas anti-tank missile. Now activists want to boycott Adidas for featuring him.
Israeli athlete Shalev Biton was seriously wounded in 2021 when Hamas struck his military vehicle on the Israeli side of the Gaza border.
After rehabilitation, he returned to… pic.twitter.com/CUdm9Aw1rS
— Hananya Naftali (@HananyaNaftali) September 7, 2026
The decision to feature Biton triggered a fierce backlash within days of the campaign's release. Among the critics were members of Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) and anti-Israel social media activists, as well as high-profile personas such as Spanish actor Javier Bardem, who shared several posts on Instagram condemning the decision – one of them accusing Adidas of "helping child killers get back on their feet."
On social media, the company's ads were presented in a distorted light, manufacturing a provocation against Israel, a move that gained momentum within days and went viral, racking up millions of views, shares, comments, and inciting posts against Israel.
Pro-Palestinian accounts and online activists omitted the fact that the service is a broad offering for amputees, instead presenting Biton as the campaign's exclusive presenter for the brand, under false claims that he "took part in genocide in Gaza." The posts, which at times included imagery such as a bleeding logo, garnered millions of views and thousands of shares online under the hashtag #BoycottAdidas.
Adidas's response read: "We recognise that an image used in a recent local activation by the local team has raised concerns and strong reactions. It was never our intent to cause offense, and we apologise to anyone affected." The statement, posted on the company's Adidas Arabia Instagram account, added that the Single Shoe in-store service was designed to promote inclusion and had first launched in Europe, not Israel specifically: "Across the Middle East, Adidas has been committed for many years to supporting the communities it serves," noting the service continues to expand across the Middle East, including "Palestine."
Announcing the Adidas partnership on Instagram on August 26, Biton called the Single Shoe service's Israeli launch a dream come true, describing it as part of a broader push toward a world built to accommodate people with disabilities rather than the reverse, according to The Jewish Chronicle.
Alongside the boycott calls, counter-voices also emerged online from users who praised the Adidas initiative for people with disabilities and stressed that making sports accessible to amputees should be free of political and national considerations, as well as activists and social media personas such as Hen Mazzig and journalist Stella Inger-Escobedo.
Meanwhile, the storm also took a personal toll on Biton himself. On Saturday night, Shalev updated in a story on his personal Instagram account that his page had come under a fierce attack from pro-Palestinian users and was facing possible closure due to a flood of reports and hateful comments on his profile, asking his followers to support his page to prevent its closure.
