Kyrie Irving appeared at a Mavericks press conference dressed in the kufiya, the traditional Palestinian scarf. It is not the first time that the shipowner has shown support for Palestine, although he has not spoken about the Israeli war. Recently, the player was also seen with some sneakers on which he had written the message: ‘No more genocide’ (No more genocide).
Precisely, Nike terminates contract with Irving, who even had a line of sneakers named after him, due to expressions shared on social media and in statements to the media. The shipowner has never shied away from saying what he thinks about various subjects, although he is very fond of feeding conspiracy theories: he refused to be vaccinated against COVID, said the Earth was flat…
One of the great controversies led by Irving came from a post with anti-Semitic connotations on social media. The public base a link to a film with narrative and language offensive to Jews. Furthermore, he refused to apologize for it. The Nets, then his team, He was suspended for five games for “not saying unequivocally that he does not have anti-Semitic beliefs.” He was finally able to return to action and donated $500,000 to anti-hate causes.
Now the Mavericks player shows its support for Palestine in the midst of the conflict against Israel. A gesture that will certainly not go down well with the NBA, an organization in which many of the franchise owners are of Jewish origin.
