Following a brutal hit during last Sunday's Texans and Jaguars game. Texans linebacker Azeez Al-shaair is getting a wave of backlash for his pro-Palestine cleats. We'll get to the cleat controversy in a second, but first, some context. [00:00:16] During the game, Al-shaair delivered a nasty hit to the Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence. Due to copyright reasons, we can't show you the clip, but here are a couple screenshots of the replay. Lawrence, who had possession of the ball, started to slide to the ground to surrender himself and avoid contact with Al-shaair. [00:00:33] You can see that here. But Al-shaer didn't stop and tackled Lawrence, hitting him in the head and neck, leading with his arm. If you're unfamiliar with football, a big no no, the quarterback's down. You want to protect the quarterback. You can't do that. [00:00:48] Also extremely dangerous. And that hit resulted in a huge brawl between Al-shaair and other members of the Jaguars. Lawrence ended up being escorted off the field with a concussion and was placed on injury. Reserve and ended his season. [00:01:04] Al-qahir, meanwhile, was placed on a three game suspension for the illegal hit. So why are we talking about this? People online wanted to make this political due to Lawrence being a devoted Christian and Al-shaer being Muslim and a supporter of Palestine. [00:01:20] You could see one response here. Terrorist sympathizer absolutely hitting a super devout Christian whilst wearing Pro-hamas cleats. Blank. Aziz Al-shaer should be canceled. [00:01:37] NFL players have the opportunity to participate in a program called My Cause My Cleats, where players are able to design their own cleats and raise money for specific charities. And these were Al-qadir's cleats. You can see it says Free Palestine. [00:01:53] Surely to Allah we belong and to him we will all return. And then you could see on the other interior on his left shoe. At least 41,788 Palestinians killed ten 000 plus estimated to be under [00:02:08] the rubble. 96,794 wounded, and he was representing and raising funds for the Palestine Children's Relief Fund, PCF. But because they're pro-Palestine, people immediately went to terrorist sympathizer and believed he was purposely targeting Lawrence. [00:02:27] Someone else wrote. It is no coincidence that terrorist sympathizer Aziz Al-shaar acted like one on the field today. Jake, did you see this hit and what do you make of this? I wouldn't call it a controversy. We just line of attack and criticism against him for his beliefs. [00:02:45] Yeah, so there's two totally separate issues here. One is the hit and the other is the reaction. Okay, the hit was terrible. And so if you don't follow football, it's sometimes hard to tell. Okay. Well I mean they're hitting each other all the time. Why is this one out of bounds? [00:03:01] No, this is if you do watch football, you know that this is the type of thing that leads to significant injuries. And that's why they've, you know, made it against the rules and significantly so, in fact, he got ejected from that game and obviously got the three game suspension. [00:03:16] Should he have gotten the three game suspension? Definitely. It was one of the worst hits that I've seen. And and part of the reason why it was so bad is because he actually led with his forearm. Like he drove through Trevor Lawrence's head with the forearm. And then when Trevor Lawrence's arms, you know, snapped into what they [00:03:36] call fencing posture, that's what happens when you get a concussion sometimes if it's severe enough. I was so scared for him. And then Al-qahir afterwards reacted so poorly. So there was a giant fight. I get it, somebody hitting you, you want to, your dander is going to go up, etc. [00:03:51] But you did a terrible dirty hit. Get off the field. And he hung around for a long time. He prolonged the fight. He was yelling at the fans as he's going out. They had to take the guy off on a cart. Man, don't yell at the fans, get off the field. Okay, so I couldn't, you know, condemn the hit strongly enough. [00:04:09] Now, when you get to the reaction. Wait, what? What does this have to do with religion? Right. So he thinks free Palestine. And it's terrible that 41,000 people were killed. Now, of course, the updated number is over 44,000 Palestinians have been killed. So is their idea that. [00:04:27] Oh, since you did a dirty hit on a in a football game, more Palestinian children should be murdered. Oh, wait, who's the terrorist sympathizer again? Because we're arguing that less innocent civilians should be killed, [00:04:44] whether they're in Israel or in Gaza. And apparently these knuckleheads are arguing, yeah, kill more of the children of the Palestinians. And I'm pretty sure I know who the terrorist sympathizer is. And of course, at this point, Israel is a terrorist state that is totally outside the laws. [00:05:01] And Amnesty International today declared, what's happening, a genocide. It's about time. It's obviously a genocide. It's. I mean, look at Gaza. They've destroyed 90% of the buildings. It's a slaughterhouse. Everyone should condemn that. I love that he had those shoes on. [00:05:18] That's a saving grace. But by the way, Jordan, I'm going to add one little thing here, which is that I don't I'm sure that there are real right wingers in there, and I'm sure that there are real Christian fundamentalists who are upset that are in there. But I sense a little bit of pro-Israel propaganda in here and trying to turn [00:05:35] this issue, which was about football, into being pro-Israel, because maybe there's a British fan who was outraged by this hit whilst he was watching. - Or maybe. - It's. [00:05:51] An Israeli bod who all of a sudden took advantage of this to try to, as always, demagogue Muslims and paint them as violent savages as they kill tens of thousands of innocent Muslims. [00:06:06] Yes, I drank, I don't know, Doctor Zoe Gray. 28. Does strike me as an American football fan. Whilst it's a good catch on that, maybe, but it also could just be the result [00:06:21] of pro-Israel propaganda that people have been subjected to for a year and more. So it's hard to quantify. It's hard to distill. We don't know for sure. Whilst is not, you know, a word typically used by NFL fans where we among them [00:06:39] are of a lesser IQ. But let's continue. There's more to it. On Monday, Al-Qaeda did release a statement apologizing to Lawrence while hitting back at those calling him a terrorist sympathizer. [00:06:55] I've always played the game as hard as I could, never with the intent to harm anyone. And anybody that knows me knows that I genuinely didn't see him sliding until it was too late. And it all happens in the blink of an eye to Trevor. I genuinely apologize to you for what ended up happening [00:07:11] to the rest of his teammates. I can definitely understand you having his back and defending him in a situation like that. To the rest of the people who I've called, I've been called every single name in the book from reporters with their hands ready for a story to find their villain, to racist and Islamophobic fans and people who don't know my heart [00:07:30] nor my character, which I don't need to prove to any of you. However, with the backlash, however, the backlash caused even more tension within the NFL, with the Texans general manager believing the hate and the picture being painted of him is what led to the suspension for the league to make some of the commentary [00:07:49] that he made about lack of sportsmanship, lack of coachability, lack of paying attention to the rules. Quite frankly, it's embarrassing what we what we take. Umbrage is the picture painted about Aziz, his attention, his intentions, [00:08:04] who he is as a person. Quite frankly, it's blank. Al-shaer did attempt to appeal his suspension. He ultimately failed, which led to this tweet. If you want me to be your villain, I'll be your villain. See you soon with a picture of the Joker. [00:08:22] I mean, I watched the I didn't see the game. I was out, but I saw the highlights and I saw that clip. It was fast, but I don't think it was an accident. I think leading with the forearm at, you know, the quarterback is going to slide there. [00:08:38] I it was it was pretty dirty. It's hard to justify the hit. It certainly does not justify Islamophobia racism, hate toward him and certainly is not reflective of what's happening in Gaza or that it should continue. So filthy hit. [00:08:54] And I think you can compartmentalize all the other aspects for sure. Yeah, I watched it live. It was terrible. It was a terrible hit. And so him complaining about the three game suspension and saying, That's Islamophobia. No, it deserved a three game suspension. Okay. Now, if they take into this, this like fervor and hatred against them [00:09:13] based on Islamophobia and they increase the penalty, no, then they're giving into pressure. And then I would be against that. But for now, I think the NFL acted exactly right. Trevor Lawrence, of course. Exactly right. And we our heart goes out to him. He's out for the rest of the season. Hope he comes back strong next year. [00:09:30] And for all the people who, instead of attacking us, are here for what he did, they're attacking him for who he is. You've just made a bad situation way worse by bringing in your racism and your hatred of, Muslims and and do better, [00:09:48] be a better human being and stop like you're not a good person if you say, I can't believe he did a dirty hit. And I would love for more Palestinian kids to be killed. So you're, in fact, you're a terrible person. Everyone should be rooting for a cease fire right now, this exact minute. [00:10:07] And because every day that it goes on. Israel slaughters more people. 89. One day 20. Today, hitting civilian after civilian after civilian and killing their own hostages because they're bombing indiscriminately. So it's just landing and they go, oh, we didn't know there were hostages there. [00:10:24] I guess we killed them. So what? We're just killing indiscriminately. And if you think they're not killing indiscriminately and that they're a moral army, I mean, you've lost your mind. You're totally detached from reality. No one believes you other than the pro-Israel zealots. And, And if you want to weigh the two, two random stories, not at all connected. [00:10:45] The hit was outrageous. And what Israel has done is approximately 4 trillion times worse. Thanks for watching the video, guys. We also love it if you hit the join button below, because that makes you a member. And members allow us to be independent, honest. We can be as progressive as we want. [00:11:01] No corporate media influence. And that's all because of you guys. We love doing the show with our members. Hit the join button and become one of the Young Turks.