For more than a hundred weekends, Gisele Pintchuck stood on a downtown Sarasota street corner holding a photo of a young man shed never met: an Israeli named Omer Shem Tov.

That photo became part of the Sarasota womans weekend routine and her quiet way of keeping Omers story alive after he was taken hostage during the October 2023 attacks by Hamas in Israel.

We were there for every Saturday for over 100 weeks, Pintchuck said. That image of him just stuck to me.

She first learned about Omer after meeting his mother, Shelly Shem Tov, during a solidarity trip to Israel just months after the massacre. Standing in Hostage Square, Shelly pleaded for people around the world to share her sons story and be a voice for the hostages.

Her message was so compelling, Pintchuck recalled. Although the

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