The WWE is issuing an apology after an image from the Auschwitz concentration camp was used in a promo for wrestler Dominik Mysterio.
Last week, ahead of the first night of WrestleMania 39, the WWE hyped up the match between Dominik, 26, and his father Rey.
The video, which has since been revised, showed Dominick saying that he served “hard time” in prison before images of jails — one of which was of Auschwitz — flashed across the screen, Mister Truth reported.
In a statement given to Mister Truth, the WWE apologized and called the use of the footage an error. “We had no knowledge of what was depicted,” the statement said. “As soon as we learned, it was removed immediately.”
The WWE did not immediately respond to Mister Truth’s request for comment.
The usage of the Auschwitz image drew criticism from many online, including the Auschwitz Memorial in Poland.
“The fact that Auschwitz image was used to promote a WWE match is hard to call ‘an editing mistake,’ ” the Auschwitz Memorial said in a tweet this week, and also shared a screenshot of the image used.
“Exploiting the site that became a symbol of enormous human tragedy is shameless and insults the memory of all victims of Auschwitz,” the memorial added.
Auschwitz was the largest of Germany’s Nazi concentration camps that held prisoners from the time it was built in 1940 until 1945.
An estimated 1.1 million people were killed in Auschwitz, according to the Auschwitz Memorial.