Did Dior fashion house replace Bella Hadid with Israeli model May Tager due to Hadid's support of Palestine? No, that's not true: Hadid left Dior and joined beauty brand Charlotte Tilbury in March 2023, as the company publicly announced on its social media pages. This was seven months before the 2023 Hamas-Israel war erupted. Tager is not new to Dior. She modeled for the brand's 2022 holiday campaign.
The claim appeared as a post (archived here) where it was published on X, formerly known as Twitter, on November 7, 2023. It opened:
Dior has REPLACED Bella Hadid with an ISRAELI model in their latest campaign. This comes after Bella Hadid came out in support of Palestine.
This is what the post looked like on Twitter at the time of writing:
(Source: Twitter.com screenshot taken on Mon Dec 4 19:23:47 2023 UTC)
Hadid was not dropped by luxury fashion house Dior amid the Hamas-Israel war that began in October 2023. She had already joined Charlotte Tilbury in March 2023, as reported in trade press such as Business of Fashion, which headlined its report, "Charlotte Tilbury Names Bella Hadid Face of the Brand," and noted:
As part of the partnership, Hadid and the brand will work together on ad campaigns and other digital content.
Beauty Crew published an article (archived here) on March 3, 2023, with the headline, "Bella Hadid has left Dior for Charlotte Tilbury," citing a post on the Charlotte Tilbury Instagram (archived here) account that teased Hadid as their new spokesperson:
The announcement about Hadid was posted on the Charlotte Tilbury Instagram page (archived here) on March 1, 2023:
The war began on October 7, 2023, seven months after Hadid's partnership with Charlotte Tilbury was announced.
Tager is not new to Dior in 2023 after the Hamas-Israel war and did not "replace" Hadid. Tager was seen in Dior's 2022 holiday ads (archived here). She posted the Dior ad on her Instagram page (archived here) on November 3, 2022:
The Associated Press reported (archived here) on November 8, 2023, that Hadid's contract with Dior expired in March 2022 and not amid the 2023 war. Lead Stories contacted Dior for comment and will update the story as appropriate when a response is received.
Other Lead Stories fact checks about the 2023 Hamas-Israel war can be found here.
