Anti-Semitism and the Suicide of Jonathan Brostoff

On 4th November 2024 we were greeted with the news that Jonathan Brostoff - a long-time jewish politician, former assembly representative and at the time of his death an alderman of the city of Milwaukee – had committed suicide.

I don’t pass judgement on Brostoff decision to top himself but rather what I wanted to talk about here is the bizarre attempt by Wisconsin’s jewish community to claim that Brostoff blew his proverbial brains out because he was a ‘victim of anti-Semitism’.

Rob Golub of the ‘Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle’ writes that:

‘“Antisemitism caused Jonathan great pain. Perhaps a greater pain than most Jews felt,” said state Assembly Rep. Daniel Riemer, about Brostoff, his childhood friend. Brostoff believed in a better world.

“What was great about him is just that he always focused on other people,” said Holman, a local artist. “And he considered everything that he was doing a mitzvah, trying to help people make the world a better place.”

And, Safer noted: “Jonathan was a Zionist to the core. He loved Israel.”’ (1)

And Amy Waldman implying something similar in her opinion column on Brostoff’s suicide in the same publication when she inexplicably starts rambling on about his jewishness and pro-Israel politics:

‘Regarding Israel and Palestine: We Americans do love our binaries, and as Jews, we are feeling all kinds of pain and have been since Oct. 7. And the lack of nuance and space for expressing that pain, or for deep reflection that might result in expressing uncomfortable thoughts, is real. No one should be ostracized for stating that the hostages need to be released, or that innocents in Gaza deserve safety. It’s possible to be Jewish and not a Zionist; it’s possible to be a Zionist and not a Jew. There’s a difference between religious faith and national identity, between people and government, and there has to be room – even if we don’t agree, even if what we hear is hard and painful – to respect the humanity of the person in front of us.’ (2)

The problem with this narrative is simple enough and despite Golub and Waldman’s attempts to pooh-pooh it turns out that Brostoff was both widely hated by the citizens of Milwaukee and the state of Wisconsin more generally for reasons completely unrelated to his jewishness and full-throated endorsement of Israel’s conduct historically and currently as Golub himself is forced to note:

‘When Milwaukee Alderman Jonathan Brostoff, a former state Assembly representative, died by suicide Monday, Nov. 4, it was after months of bullying tied to his identity as a Jew and supporter of Israel, according to longtime friends and colleagues.

Social media attacks from former friends and allies broke his heart, they say. Longtime friends reportedly ostracized Brostoff and his wife. Then, just before his death, the Shepherd Express – the city’s storied alternative newspaper – named him a finalist for “Most Despised Politician.”

Brostoff talked with friends about how he was treated. Several people interviewed said it weighed on him considerably.

Brostoff wrote in local media that in the past he experienced mental health challenges. In multiple interviews with people who knew him, nobody suggested the bullying of Brostoff was the only cause of his death by suicide. But friends say the bullying, including rejection by some on the left who were close to him, must have been a factor.

Milwaukee County Supervisor Sheldon Wasserman, his friend, is among those who see a connection between the alderman’s tragic death and how Brostoff was treated after Oct. 7, 2023. “He told me about how he suffered with it,” Wasserman said.’ (3)

Put another way Brostoff was a hated local politician in the city of Milwaukee and the wider state of Wisconsin who was despised for his conduct as well as his local politics and policies not because he was jewish and pro-Israel.

Indeed - as Golub notes – Brostoff had a long history of severe depression and further we know from Brosoff himself that as both a teenager and an adult; he had previously attempted to take his own life on several different occasions with him writing in 2019 that:

‘“Years before I welcomed my firstborn into the world, before I was elected to serve my community in the state Assembly, before I met and married the love of my life, I was just a kid in Milwaukee who was living with mental illness. As a teenager, I had been diagnosed with ADD, ADHD, severe depression and bipolar disorder — and I was struggling. I wish those diagnoses and the attendant medications, hospital stays, and all of the other steps my family and I took at the time had been enough. But as is the case for many facing mental health crises, they weren’t.

All those years ago, staring down the darkness, I attempted to take my own life. More than once. And as someone who has faced that darkness and lived to share my story, I am so thankful I didn’t have access to a gun when I thought that leaving this world was the best way to handle everything that came with it.”’ (4)

Put another way Brostoff was widely hated for his local policies and politics, severely depressed and attempted suicide repeatedly throughout his life which was all complexly unconnected to his being jewish and his pro-Israel politics.

All Brostoff actually was in truth was a severely depressed and mentally-ill jew in need of serious therapy who wouldn’t give up his extremely stressful job in politics and eventually committed suicide because of it.

It had absolutely nothing to do with his being jewish or so-called ‘anti-Semitism’ direct at him, but what that does go to show is that jews will claim that absolutely anything is ‘anti-Semitic’ to try and detract from their own personal and/or collective responsibility for it!

References

(1) https://www.jewishchronicle.org/2024/12/04/friends-say-alderman-jonathan-brostoffs-tragic-death-came-after-months-of-bullying-tied-to-his-jewish-and-zionist-identities/

(2) https://www.jewishchronicle.org/2024/12/04/when-the-loss-is-unimaginable/

(3) https://www.jewishchronicle.org/2024/12/04/friends-say-alderman-jonathan-brostoffs-tragic-death-came-after-months-of-bullying-tied-to-his-jewish-and-zionist-identities/

(4) https://urbanmilwaukee.com/2019/10/23/op-ed-lets-talk-honestly-about-suicide/