Hezbollah rocket wounds son of Israeli finance minister

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s son was wounded by a Hezbollah rocket on Friday, Smotrich revealed on Monday evening.

“Last Friday, terrorists fired a mortar shell toward Givati soldiers on the Lebanese border, and eight soldiers were wounded. One of them is my beloved son, Binyah Hevron,” Smotrich tweeted on Monday evening.

“Shrapnel penetrated his back and abdomen,” the Israeli finance minister wrote in his X post. “He was rushed to the hospital, and only there did we discover the great miracle that had happened to us.”

“By the grace of God, one of the fragments tore the liver and stopped at the wall of the largest blood vessel in the abdomen. Had it, God forbid, been damaged, the situation would’ve been far more serious,” he said.

Iranian-backed Hezbollah began firing rockets and UAVs at Israel on the morning of March 2, in retaliation for Israel’s targeted killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. He was killed in the opening shot of “Operation Roaring Lion/Epic Fury” against the regime on Feb. 28.

Eight Israel Defense Forces soldiers were injured, including five who were seriously wounded, in Friday’s Hezbollah rocket attack, which targeted an IDF military position near the northern border. Binyah sustained light to moderate wounds, according to initial reports.

Smotrich on Monday extended gratitude to “everyone who cared, called, prayed, or asked” about his son’s injuries, saying the family was “deeply moved by the great embrace from the entire people of Israel.”

Smotrich said that his son remained “strong and determined,” and that “with God’s help, after rehabilitation and dedicated treatment, he will recover and return to us and to the IDF.”

“Sadly, several of his friends were also seriously wounded, and we all pray for their recovery, together with all the heroic wounded IDF troops,” the finance minister wrote.

“For the past two and a half years, I have been sitting in the Cabinet and in the forums leading the war with awe and trembling, aware that every decision concerns life and death—not only for my own children on the front lines, but for all of our precious soldiers, whom I see as my own sons,” said Smotrich.

“The price of war is not simple for any of us, but faith in the justice of our path, the victory over our enemies, and the future of the entire people of Israel give us hope and strength,” he continued.

In response to Hezbollah’s violations of the U.S.-brokered Nov. 27, 2024, truce deal, Jerusalem launched an aerial campaign against the terrorist organization, in addition to ordering IDF troops to advance and take control of additional areas in Lebanon to halt cross-border assaults.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Monday that Hezbollah’s attacks had opened up opportunities for Israel to strike the terror group to “exact a price from it” and restore “great security” to Israel’s north.