Kyrie Irving explains why he paid Texans LB Azeez Al-Shaair's NFL fine: 'He's a brother'

A few weeks after he made waves for his pledge to pay Azeez Al-Shaair's NFL fine, Mavericks guard Kyrie Irving finally spoke publicly on the matter.

Al-Shaair received a fine from the NFL for having the name of Hind Rajab, a slain Palestinian girl, on his eye black during Houston's Week 1 game. Irving announced on social media in September that he would pay Al-Shaair's $11,492 fine. Rajab was a 5-year-old Palestinian girl who was killed in Gaza in Jan. 2024.

“He’s a friend of mine," Irving said after the Mavericks' season-opening loss to Houston. "He’s a brother that I consider in this revolution that a lot of this generation is building. It’s a selfless act when you can show up for others that don’t necessarily have a voice for themselves.

"It's a lot of innocent people that are losing their lives, children especially. Any time there's a war or conflict, there's going to be, unfortunately, deaths and murders going on. Us here in America, we get the luxury of going to bed at night in our nice bedrooms and things paid for. But when our tax dollars are going towards things that we don't necessarily agree with, we have to stand up."

Both Irving and Al-Shaair are Muslim. Al-Shaair has been fined for similar acts in the past, as he received a fine in January for writing "stop the genocide" on his eye black, according to ESPN. He has supported Palestinian cuases on the field over the past few seasons in multiple ways.

Irving converted to Islam in 2021 and has been a frequent and staunch supporter of Palestinian causes.

Kyrie Irving on why it was important for him to say he’d pay the fine for Texans LB Azeez Al-Shaair, who wore the name Hind Rajab on his eye black during Week 1. Rajab was a 5-year-old Palestinian girl killed in Gaza in Jan. 2024. “He’s a friend of mine. He’s a brother that I consider in this revolution that a lot of this generation is building. It’s a selfless act when you can show up for others that don’t necessarily have a voice for themselves.”

— Mike Curtis (@MikeACurtis2) October 22, 2026

"I think small instances of revolutionary acts like wearing people's names or wearing a child's name like Hind Rajab on your face and taking a fine and stepping up to the plate, it just shows how much you're a selfless person, how much you're willing to sacrifice," Irving continued. "This mission is bigger than just me and Azeez, we know that.

"But our strength is in our solidarity and how connected we are and how united we are in our efforts. It's a bigger conversation, but any time you bring in political conversation to basketball, it does get muddy so I try my best to do the work in silence and stand with people that are actually not afraid to stand with them."

Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed more than 73,000 people, including tens of thousands of women and children, according to the territory’s Health Ministry. Rights groups and U.N. commissions have said the campaign amounts to genocide and that Israeli forces have committed a litany of war crimes, including indiscriminate use of force and deliberate killings of civilians.

Israel denies accusations of genocide and war crimes and says it is targeting Hamas after its October 2023 attack on southern Israel. It blames civilian deaths on Hamas because the militant group operates in populated areas in the tiny, overcrowded strip.

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This article originally published at Kyrie Irving explains why he paid Texans LB Azeez Al-Shaair's NFL fine: 'He's a brother'.