Amazon is no longer selling a T-shirt that reads “Make Israel Palestine Again” amid outrage from consumers and followers of the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT), a nonprofit that tracks radical Islam.
Promoted by activists from the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, the shirts were listed as “In Stock. Ships from and sold by Amazon.com,” as opposed to some merchandise Amazon sells that comes from third parties.
The product, modeled after U.S. President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan, outraged many IPT readers. “One complained directly to Amazon and said she was assured the T-shirt in question would be removed,” said IPT senior analyst John Rossomando. “The one IPT exposed Tuesday was taken down by late Wednesday evening.”
T-shirts with the same motto were sold on the site until Thursday at noon through a third-party seller using Amazon’s “Merch program,” which allows merchants to create accounts to sell customized T-shirts, an Amazon spokesperson told the IPT. There were no indications that the shirts were from third-party vendors on Tuesday when the IPT selected the “Add to Cart” button.
“All Merch by Amazon content creators must follow our content policy and those who do not will be subject to action including potential removal of their account,” an Amazon spokesperson told the IPT. “The product in question is no longer available.”
Those policies prohibit material that promotes intolerance, hate or violence.