I can reproduce this on BackTrack 4 R2 VM and on a Backtrack 4 R1 VM updated to R2.

Static linking seems to be broken:
Code:
root@bt:~# gcc -static -o printf printf.c
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.3.2/../../../../lib/libc.a(elf-init.o): In function `__libc_csu_irel':
(.text+0xe5): undefined reference to `__rel_iplt_end'
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.3.2/../../../../lib/libc.a(elf-init.o): In function `__libc_csu_irel':
(.text+0xec): undefined reference to `__rel_iplt_start'
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.3.2/../../../../lib/libc.a(elf-init.o): In function `__libc_csu_irel':
(.text+0xfd): undefined reference to `__rel_iplt_start'
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.3.2/../../../../lib/libc.a(elf-init.o): In function `__libc_csu_irel':
(.text+0x106): undefined reference to `__rel_iplt_start'
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.3.2/../../../../lib/libc.a(elf-init.o): In function `__libc_csu_irel':
(.text+0x113): undefined reference to `__rel_iplt_start'
/usr/lib/gcc/i486-linux-gnu/4.3.2/../../../../lib/libc.a(elf-init.o): In function `__libc_csu_irel':
(.text+0x11b): undefined reference to `__rel_iplt_start'
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
The problem seems related to this: Fix missing symbols in .rel/.rela.plt sections - Patchwork

Dynamic linking is fine, but I have this problem for all static builds.