By Emily K. Alhadeff , Assistant Editor, JTNews
As Giti Fredman talks, a theme emerges: Inspiration. She describes how she landed in West Seattle (of all places), building Jewish community and leading women’s trips to Israel as a result of inspired choices and an unusually grounded sense that she can make change in the world.
The Lakewood, N.J. native had her life more or less planned out during the eight years she and her husband, Rabbi David Fredman, spent living in Jerusalem and Ramat Beit Shemesh, where she ran a baking business.
“We thought we were going to live in Israel forever,” Giti, 29, says.
But after her husband was inspired by a going-away party for his best friend, who had been hired by the Seattle Kollel’s Rabbi Avrohom David to lead a Kollel in Portland, they knew what they had to do. The Fredmans picked up and moved to West Seattle to help build the Jewish community. The couple runs the West Seattle Torah Learning Center, where they dedicate their time to hosting Shabbat meals, leading classes and holding events.
“Our goal is just to unite and get to know the Jews of West Seattle and let them know there is a Jewish resource here,” Giti says.
The Torah Learning Center is one of two synagogues that have popped up in West Seattle in recent years. But she tries to dispel the myth that one can only attend the institution where he or she pays dues.
“We’re not just a synagogue, we’re a Jewish resource,” she says. “It’s not a contradiction. You can be a member somewhere else and come to our Shabbat dinner.”
Besides, she pointed out, they don’t collect dues.
The same sense of following a calling that brought the Fredmans to Seattle is what gave Giti the strength to start leading yearly trips to Israel for Jewish mothers. The trip is through the Jewish Women’s Renaissance Project, which focuses on bringing Jewish values to a central place in Jewish homes through women’s education.
“I knew about this trip for a while, and I thought, ‘I can’t do it, I can’t leave the kids,’” she says (she’s got four). But after attending a conference for women in kiruv — the practice of reaching out to less observant Jews — and hearing more about the JWRP, she changed her mind. After the conference she called her husband and her mother-in-law to let them know they would be taking care of the kids while she went to Israel.
“It’s kind of like a Birthright for Jewish moms,” Fredman says.
By taking women with children still at home to Israel to engage more deeply with Judaism, she hopes that the women will return and “inspire her husband and her kids living at home.”
“All these women are bringing what they learned back to their families,” she says. “All the women are more committed to learning about Judaism.”
What’s unique about Fredman as a woman to watch is her dedication to Jewish womanhood in and of itself.
“We believe the woman is the foundation of the home,” she says.
Fredman hosts the monthly Lunar Latte Rosh Chodesh women’s discussion group and until recently was leading a Jewish Mommy and Me series. Her new project is “Jewish Kids in the Kitchen” and she’d like to start a Jewish story time.
“I feel like I’m a Jewish woman, I have a lot of talent, I’m really capable and have a lot of energy,” she says. “I have a deep desire to share what I know with other women. I’m very happy with my role.”
For more information about attending the next Jewish Women’s Renaissance Project, which leaves later this month, contact Shaindel Bresler at shainbresler@yahoo.com or 206-779-4373.