Brooke Goldstein

Brooke Goldstein was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She is a graduate of McGill University and the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law. Goldstein is a human rights attorney. She is the founder and Executive Director of The Lawfare Project.

Quotes

• materializing in ways that we could only imagine in our worst nightmare.”
• We are all very concerned,”
• “now is the time for a Jewish civil rights movement” and pointed out that “litigation is always the last resort.”
• “important to work with them to guide them on what to do.”
• “outstanding complaint” they filed on behalf of a client at Columbia University who was allegedly spat on and called a “dirty Zionist” in the university quad; this happened four years ago,
  • Lawfare Project Webinar Explains Legal Rights on Campus Jewish Journal (November 9, 2023)
• “There is this very liberal, democratic tradition in our country: using the courts to engage in litigation to uphold the basic rights of minorities,”
• “Yet, while Jews have always been at the forefront of advocating for other minorities — Rabbi [Abraham Joshua] Heschel marching with Martin Luther King [Jr.], for example — we have never ourselves, as a minority community, really taken advantage of our rights to equal protection under the law, by strategically using the legal system to fight against anti-Semitic discrimination.”
• “If we don’t fight to enforce our rights, why should we expect anyone to respect them?”
• “Exposing the state-sponsored indoctrination and recruitment of innocent Muslim children was eye-opening,” she said. “This hate education is the root cause of terrorism.”
• “When I first proposed a Jewish civil rights litigation fund there was backlash from some of the traditional Jewish leadership,” Goldstein said. “ ‘That’s too aggressive,’
• As a civil rights attorney, aggressively asserting the rights of my clients to be free from unlawful discrimination is a compliment. That means you’re a good lawyer. Can you imagine the NAACP (The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) being accused by the black community of too aggressively advocating for black civil rights? If we don’t stand up for ourselves, who will? And if we don’t fight to enforce our rights, why should we expect anyone to respect them?”
• We should be able to stand up like every other minority group in this country and say we deserve justice — and say it loudly. We have every right to avail ourselves of the legal system, to equal protection under the law.
• “The community spends so much money on so-called pro-Israel advocacy, and it’s not moving the needle. Dollars are being spent educating Jewish students how to defend themselves, handing out pamphlets and leaflets for them to memorize, as though it’s the job of a Jewish student to defend Israel. The change you can make with one lawsuit or even one legal letter is enormous,” she said. “Not only can you ensure that the rights of your clients are respected and protected, and that similar unlawful behavior is deterred, but you go from defense to offense. And when one minority community enforces the law, all minority communities benefit.”
• “We have never ourselves, as a minority community, really taken advantage of our rights to equal protection under the law, by strategically using the legal system to fight against anti-Semitic discrimination.”
• “If you can’t articulate why Jews, a minority community, deserve the right to sovereignty, then you have already ceded that space to the Jew-haters who are invading the left, and who seek to move the left toward a place that denies the right of Israel to exist,”
• “I’m reminded of M.J. Nurenberger’s ‘The Scared and the Doomed,’ ” “During our people’s darkest hour, as Hitler’s war machine kicked into high gear, much of the Diaspora establishment eschewed collective action to save European Jewry. These cosmopolitan, assimilated Jews did not want to risk their hard-earned place in American society by speaking out of turn. They wanted to be a part of the prevailing culture, not disturb it.”
• “the price of anti-Semitism in the U.S. is plummeting. And it’s only going to get cheaper if American Jews avoid demanding respect and asserting their Jewish Zionist pride. It’s time for the Jewish community as a whole to reject the anti-Semitic regressive left, not empower it,”
• “Don’t expect any civil rights movement to respect you if you don’t respect yourself. We are strong when we lead by example, not when we bow to radicalism or partisanship.”
• “We will continue to do what we do best,” Goldstein said. “Advocate against Jew-hatred and file groundbreaking civil rights cases to ensure our clients achieve the respect they deserve.”
• “We will argue, on the basis of anti-discrimination law, against applying the requirements exclusively to Israel,” Goldstein said. “We are committed to challenging enforcement in every country and every locality that attempts to discriminate on the basis of ethnicity or religion.”
• An intelligent, forceful Jewish pride movement… Jews have always supported other minority pride movements. Now it’s time for ours.”
  • Brooke Goldstein Upholds the Civil Rights of Jews Jewish Journal (December 4, 2019)