(Washington, D.C., 7/16/2025) – The US Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO), America’s umbrella group of Muslim associations, strongly denounces Georgetown University’s removal and investigation of esteemed Muslim scholar, Dr. Jonathan Brown, as chair of Islamic Civilization in the School of Foreign Service based on a willfully misinterpreted pretext.
The Georgetown president’s craven cave-in came during a congressional hearing witch-hunt staged by well-known anti-Palestinian, anti-Muslim congress members against Brown. They deliberately falsified a social media comment Brown made expressing what countless other commentators in academia, the media, and government also said after the June 22nd U.S. bombings of Iran’s nuclear facilities: hope for a quick, non-lethal symbolic Iranian response that would end hostilities.
Georgetown University’s Interim President Robert Grove fed into dishonest attacks on Brown over the tweet, which he later deleted and clarified, by announcing that his administration had removed Brown as chair and was deliberating further disciplinary action against him.
USCMO Secretary General Oussama Jammal said today in a statement:
“Georgetown University needs to find its spine and immediately reinstate Professor Jonathan Brown to his full duties as chair.
“These are academics themselves. They know exactly what Dr. Brown intended and what his words meant because the same message was expressed by others the length and breadth of our nation. The only ones who weren’t saying exactly what Dr. Brown tweeted were pro-Israel war hawks salivating for a significant Iranian response that would drag the U.S. into a regime change war.
“Georgetown’s administrators need to quickly relocate their moral compass. Dr. Brown is one of America’s most critically important Islamic studies scholars. His peers esteem his work, and he has rockstar popularity in our Muslim communities.
“He’s that rare scholar who takes the critical step forward into the public square as an outspoken advocate for open dialogue and just causes across the American social and religious spectrum.
“Georgetown’s Interim President Grove and all the school’s administrators also know exactly what yesterday’s congressional witch-hunt was about. Dr. Brown has been openly opposing Israel’s unconscionable Gaza genocide.
So these shameless Congressional advocates of weaponizing starvation and indiscriminate child slaughter, of Gaza’s utter demolition, reoccupation, and illegal ethnic cleansing want to punish and persecute Dr. Brown because he champions peace and life for Palestinians, because he acknowledges the people of Gaza as human beings.
“This congressional cabal wants to intimidate other public intellectuals from speaking out by making an example out of Dr. Brown.
“Georgetown University cannot let this stand. They must rally to their educational leaders and entire community of leaners.”
USCMO and American Muslims demand that Georgetown University Interim President Grove and school administrators immediately and fully reinstate Professor Jonanthan Brown as chair of the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Chair of Islamic Civilization in the School of Foreign Service.
For their own integrity and future as a learning community, we urge Georgetown’s administration and leadership to make explicitly clear their unwavering support for Dr. Brown, and the university’s entire faculty and students now teaching and learning under a pall of censorship and fear of expulsion for exercising freedom of mind, the primary mission of Georgetown University.
Without this, the integrity and longstanding global regard for American higher education are utterly lost.
###
