A New Year, A New Mission - Dudi Lev's Fight To Recover & Cope With PTSD Thanks To FIDF Support

The Hezbollah rocket destroyed Lev’s right eye, shattered his hand, crushed his leg and damaged his hearing. He survived, barely. “I was awake the whole time,” he said recently from an FIDF funded Beit HaLochem in Haifa, a rehabilitation center for wounded Israeli soldiers. “I felt everything.”

Lev, a former special forces soldier, had returned to combat after October 7th, 2023, when Hamas’s attack in the south raised fears of a wider war. Many elite units were redeployed south, leaving limited forces to guard Israel’s northern border. In Metula, Lev and a small group of reservists and veterans of elite IDF units became the town’s and the country’s, first and last line of defense.

For months, they operated under near-daily rocket and drone fire, sleeping in abandoned homes and moving cautiously through empty streets. Intelligence reports warned that thousands of Hezbollah fighters were positioned just across the border ready to replicate Hamas’s October 7th Attack. Moments of calm were rare and never fully trusted.

It was during one such lull that Lev was asked to help a family whose home had been destroyed by a Hezbollah rocket. As he and his partner escorted them in an open-air ATV, a missile struck right next to their vehicle. The blast threw Lev into the ground. His partner pulled him to safety, hiding with him in a roadside ditch while waiting for evacuation, unsure whether a follow up strike or an ambush would follow.

Lev spent days in a coma and more than four months hospitalized at Rambam Medical Center in Haifa. “I used to be independent,” he said. “Suddenly, I needed help with everything.” The physical injuries were severe, but the psychological ones, he says, ran deeper.

Now, in early 2026, Lev is focused on a resolution he has set for the new year: to complete his rehabilitation and find a sustainable way to live with his PTSD. At Beit HaLochem he spends his days relearning how to walk, managing a brace on his leg and working through the lingering limitations of his right arm. Hearing loss challenges his balance. Alongside physical therapy, he participates in a specialized PTSD treatment program developed by Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF), in partnership with Sheba Medical Center.

Lev meets weekly with a trauma psychologist named Michael, learning to untangle layers of trauma, the blast itself, the helplessness of recovery and grief for the life he lost. “He doesn’t try to fix me,” Lev said. “He gives me the space to be broken without judgment and pushes me to find the solutions to each trial we encounter because he understands how I think and that if I can’t find the solution on my own, I would not be able to accept it.”

Therapy has also helped him reconnect with his children, strained by months of anger and withdrawal. “After the attack they didn’t know how to approach me,” he said. “And I didn’t know how to approach them.” Now that he can manage his pain the distance is closing.

Nearly 4,000 soldiers across Israel receive PTSD care through the FIDF–Sheba partnership, some at long-established Beit HaLochem centers, others at sites opened after October 7th, 2023. Since the initial Hamas attack, FIDF has funded more than 10 mental health clinics throughout the country. Programs like these, Lev says, are as vital as any surgery or medical intervention. “Surgery kept me alive,” he said. “Psychological support gave me a reason to keep going.”

As 2026 progresses, Lev is measuring progress not in headlines or medals but in small milestones, steps without a brace, moments of calm, conversation with his children and the ability to plan a life beyond the hospital walls. One day, he hopes to drive Israel’s quiet back roads in a 4x4 with his dog, Echo, discovering stillness in a world he once defended.

For now, his New Year’s resolution is simple and profound, to rebuild, to cope and to move forward. In that, he is succeeding.

Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF) is dedicated to honoring and supporting the brave men and women of the IDF who risk everything to protect the State of Israel and the Jewish people. While the mission of the IDF’s heroes is to look after Israel, defending its people, borders and freedom, FIDF’s mission is to look after them. FIDF provides life-changing support through education, financial aid, bereavement programs, mental health services and more, ensuring that every soldier, veteran and bereaved family knows they are not alone. Through global partnerships and unwavering commitment, FIDF stands as a pillar of strength for those who sacrifice so much in service to the Jewish homeland.

For more information, visit: https://www.fidf.org/