The days of “shut up and dribble” or “shut up and play” often aimed at Black athletes is unfortunately still alive and well. Azeez Al-Shaair is a Black man and a Muslim. He is also a linebacker for the Houston Texans in the National Football League.
Like many Black athletes before him, he is using his platform to speak out about important issues. He is refusing to remain silent or to just “shut up and play.”
Mr. Al-Shaair is the latest in a long line of Black sports figures taking a non-violent stand on critical issues such as human rights and racial equality.
The 28 year old recently wore his eye black, emblazoned with “Stop the Genocide,” in reference to the ongoing slaughter of the Palestinian people by Israel.
According to reports, Mr. Al-Shaair initially wore the eye black on Jan. 12 during a game and during his post-game interview, and was fined $11,593 by the NFL before wearing it again on Jan. 18. However, he removed it when officials reportedly threatened to pull him from the game.
Regarding the fine, the NFL cited its “rule” which it states bans players from displaying “personal” messages. This restriction is applicable “Throughout the period on game day that a player is visible to the stadium and television audience (including in pregame warmups.
In the bench area, and during postgame interviews in the locker room or on the field),” unless the message has been pre-approved by the league office.
So, regardless of the continued slaughter of over 73,000 mostly women and children in Gaza and the atrocities suffered by the Palestinians at the hands of Israel and backed by U.S. weaponry, the NFL wants to make sure its players get “permission” to acknowledge human suffering even if it is done in a simple gesture.
But then again, this is the same league that punished star quarterback Colin Kaepernick for his simple, non-violent gesture of kneeling during the National Anthem to call attention to the killing of Black people at the hands of police.
By all accounts, Mr. Al-Shaair has been an advocate for Palestinians, so what he did was not out of the norm. According to Roya News, Mr. Al-Shaair was this season’s Texans’ Walter Payton Man of the Year for his community work and he “is a devout Muslim who has long publicly supported Palestinian causes.”
According to the Houston Chronicle, “During the NFL’s ‘My Cause, My Cleats’ campaign the past few seasons, he’s worn custom cleats to support the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund.
In 2024, his custom cleats read ‘FREE’ on one side, with the other side including a verse from the Quran: ‘Surely to Allah we belong and to him we will all return.’ He also has sat down with Gaza families who have been receiving medical treatment in Houston.”
Black athletes and entertainers are often criticized if they are not vocal when it comes to important issues. It is wonderful to see this young, Black man take a stand on behalf of a suffering people. For Mr. Al-Shaair, his reasoning for his small gesture was a simple one.
“At the end of the day, it’s bigger than me,” he told The Houston Chronicle after his team lost its Jan. 18 playoff game. “The things that are going on make people uncomfortable, imagine how those people feel.
I think that’s the biggest thing. I have no affiliation, no connection to these people other than the fact that I’m a human being. If you have a heart and you’re a human being, you can see what’s going on in the world and you check yourself real quick.
Even when I’m walking off this field, that’s the type of stuff that goes through my head that I have to check myself when I’m sitting here crying about football when there’s people dying every single day,” he said.
As people who have suffered and continue to suffer, we should be especially sensitive to the suffering of others. For those who may not understand why the Palestinian “issue” is an important issue, the answer is simple: they are human beings who are suffering.
The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, National Representative of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, the Eternal Leader of the Nation of Islam spoke about how he feels, seeing the suffering of the Palestinians, which has been going on for decades.
“The anguish that I feel started with Gaza: Helpless Palestinians against the armed might of Israel with weapons given to them by America. You tell me about ‘terror’…
You tell me how helicopter gunships, F-16s, tanks and an arsenal of armaments that are designed on explosion to rip human bodies apart—you tell me who the real ‘terrorist’ is! I’m not a Jew.
I’m not a Palestinian. I’m a human being. But if my heart, as a human, does not ache for the suffering of our people—fellow human beings, fellow sufferers and travelers on the Earth—then I am dead morally and spiritually,” Minister Farrakhan said in his 2014 message, “The Troubled World: What Should We Be Doing?”
Ten years later, during his 2024 Saviours’ Day message, “What Does Allah The Great Mahdi And The Great Messiah Have To Say About The War In The Middle East,” Minister Farrakhan, explained that he had been baptizing himself in the pain of the Palestinian people.
“Brothers and sisters, that is our family. You may not think that, but it’s okay; you have to grow beyond yourself, and you have to know there are people in this world that are connected to you far beyond your own Black skin,” he said.
“If you could look at their suffering, and it don’t move you, you have lost your humanity. If you can see a dog suffer and have compassion … If you can see your favorite horse suffer, where you’ve got to put him down, you feel pain!
Palestinian mothers are crying over the loss of their children! I watched them cry; I watched them touch their babies that are dead, and don’t want to let the baby go to be buried,” Minister Farrakhan said.
“That’s not a barbarian feeling, that’s a human feeling. I saw Jews that were suffering, too, burying their dead, and weeping as the Palestinians are weeping. These are not barbarians! They have suffered from Israel’s presence in Palestine,” he added.
The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan has a heart fashioned and shaped by Almighty God (Allah) and he is sensitive to the suffering of Black people and all of humanity. As human beings, let us strive to also have such a heart.
So, thank you, Brother Azeez Al-Shaair, for using your public platform as a star athlete to call attention to a cause that is bigger than yourself.