In a bustling real estate market dominated by high-stakes transactions and steel-nerved competition, Ayelet Gonen-Brosh brings a rare, almost poetic energy. “I’m a Pisces,” she says, “and I describe my life like a fish in the sea. I flowed with what came into my space.”
At 62, Gonen-Brosh co-owns the BROSH Group and a mother to four , a leading real estate development and contracting firm in Israel. She is now aspiring to expand her reach beyond Tel Aviv and Herzliya. Her objective? Strengthening connections with Jewish communities overseas, particularly in the U.S., to market apartments and cultivate enduring relationships based on shared values, identity, and vision.
Though her company won’t be onstage at the upcoming Jerusalem Post conference in New York, she’ll be there. "One of the reasons I want to attend is to meet up with the community face-to-face," she said candidly. "The connection with the Jewish community in New York and the Diaspora is important to me, both professionally and personally." That connection didn’t start with glossy brochures or real estate expos. It began, as much of Gonen-Brosh’s life did, by chance, curiosity, and a willingness to dive into the unknown.
Born and raised in Haifa, Gonen-Brosh began her professional life not with architecture or blueprints, but with a camera. At 18, she became a military photographer for Bamahane, the IDF’s newspaper, during the tumultuous years of the First Lebanon War.
“I was in Beirut, in Sinai during the evacuation, on the farewell flight of the Hercules squadron. I even made it to New York as a soldier!” she laughed. “Those were wild, emotional, shaping experiences. People ask why I still talk about the army service, decades after it ended," she noted. "But it defined who I am. I learned that everything is possible - you just have to want it and aim for it.”
This can-do attitude is a hallmark of Gonen-Brosh, and when asked if her gender even posed an issue in her current field of business, she smiles and shares just how far her resistance and work ethic have gotten her. “I wasn’t supposed to enter Lebanon," she recounted. "Women weren’t allowed in combat zones then. But one day I heard a team was heading to Beirut to cover Arafat’s evacuation, and I thought, ‘I have to be there.’ I just joined the crew. At the Beirut checkpoint, the officer looked at my permit and said, ‘This only goes to the Awali River.’ I asked him, ‘Where is the Awali river?’” she laughed. “He looked at me and said, ‘I didn’t see you, and you didn’t see me.’”
After the army, she studied film and photography, launching an international media career, covering the First Intifada from Gaza for the international press. “It was crazy. I spent three years in the West Bank reporting for foreign networks.” Later, she became the NBC News editor in Israel and helped to launch “Keshet Broadcasting”. However, after her third child and a sudden layoff, her path shifted.
“I stopped and asked myself, what now? Three kids at home… Then my partner suggested I join his business. 'Let’s work together,' he said,” but their collaboration was challenging. “Working with your spouse is complicated. The first five years were tough. I even left for a year to study life coaching.” Upon returning, Gonen-Brosh launched the company's entrepreneurial branch. “We transformed from a contractor into a full real estate developer with our execution team.”
Today, the BROSH Group manages a wide range of activities, including urban renewal, land acquisition, and combination deals. It’s actively engaged in various residential projects throughout Tel Aviv, Ramat Hasharon, and Herzliya. This includes developments on Louis Marshall, Romema, and Bloch streets in Tel Aviv, in addition to Bialik and Usishkin streets in Ramat Hasharon, showcasing the company’s commitment to broadening its presence in well-established urban neighborhoods while providing diverse housing choices.
The BROSH Group also has an in-house construction team boasting over 30 years of experience. “We’ve built for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. We learned how to speak their organizational language. We’re constantly evolving.” However, Gonen-Brosh e mphasizes, "We're a family business. Many of our employees have been with us for decadeBrosh s, and we strive to foster a family-like environment."
That very sense of belonging initially attracted her to Jewish diaspora communities. A few years back, before the Israeli elections, she participated in a conference organized by AIC. This U.S.-based nonprofit promotes Jewish and Israeli identity among American-born descendants of Israeli immigrants. “They identified assimilation trends in second- and third-generation Israelis in the U.S. and work to reinforce Jewish values and connections to Israel.”
What began as a business opportunity became something more meaningful. “I met incredible people, Jews and Israelis who deeply love Israel. They send their kids here to serve in the army, to study, they visit all the time. They may have left Israel, but Israel hasn’t left them.” For Gonen-Brosh, the timing was bittersweet. “We had the elections, then the judicial reform protests, then October 7. And our clients abroad stopped buying property. But we kept building the relationship, step by step, carefully. This isn’t a hit-and-run operation. You plant seeds. It takes time for them to grow.”
The connection became personal, almost ideological. “I grew up in the shadow of the Yom Kippur War. Back then, Israelis who left the country were called ‘yordim.’ It was almost a slur. I grew up thinking that if you lived abroad, you were doing something wrong.” She paused. “But then I met these amazing communities and realized they never really left. They want to come back or at least to stay connected.”
Now, Gonen-Brosh sees her work as not just commercial but as part of a mission to strengthen ties between Israel and Jewish communities globally. “Of course I want them to buy from me,” she says. “But I also want to help them come and live in Israel, to have a home in Israel. We’re developing services tailored for foreign buyers - a design package, an interior designer from day one, someone to help bridge cultural and bureaucratic gaps. It’s about speaking their language.” “It’s also about mindset," Gonen-Brosh emphasized. "You need to understand their concerns, expectations, and reality.”
Gonen-Brosh’s instinct for empathy shapes her relationships with clients and her business approach. She ensures every apartment buyer feels secure, understood, and welcomed beyond the sales process, as buying a home is an act of trust that deserves integrity, transparency, and care.
She avoids the spotlight, crediting the company’s success to a loyal team, shared effort, and collaborative culture. Her vision is clear: she believes in a better future and the power of building toward it. “Developers have to be optimists,” she asserts. “We must believe in something larger. I truly believe we can create a paradise here, not out of despair, but out of strength.”
That optimism, though, doesn’t come easy. It carries the weight of history. Gonen-Brosh had just returned from the March of the Living in Auschwitz when she spoke with us, still shaken by the experience. Her grandparents, both doctors in Berlin, were among the few who managed to leave Nazi Germany early. Her grandfather, a decorated World War I veteran, saw the writing on the wall in 1933 and fled with his family. “Those who didn’t understand in time,” she says quietly, “are walking around with their eyes shut to reality.”
But the past isn’t abstract. Since October 7, her sense of mission has only deepened. The global surge in antisemitism that followed has clarified something she long felt: for Jews around the world, safety can never be taken for granted. “We will always be seen as outsiders in other lands,” she says. “But here, in Israel, we belong. This is where we can live fully, freely, as ourselves. Not just to survive—but to thrive. To build something real. A true home. A true heaven.”
This article was written in collaboration with the BROSH Group.