'KISS' rocker sends video to Israeli soldier

JERUSALEM: Israeli-born "KISS" rocker Gene Simmons sent a get-well video to an Israeli soldier wounded in Lebanon, calling him a hero the world should be proud of.   

"I can't tell you how proud I am of you and how much the world and Israel owe you a debt of gratitude," Simmons told Ron Weinreich, a tank crewman paralysed from the chest down, in a video broadcast on Saturday on Israel's Channel 2 television.   

Channel 2 said the KISS bassist made the video for Weinreich, a fan of the legendary rock group, at the request of Israel's Soldiers' Welfare Association, a fund-raising group.   

Weinreich, hospitalised near Tel Aviv, was wounded two weeks ago in fighting against Hizbollah guerrillas.   

"From the bottom of my heart, you're a real hero, you're everybody's hero, you're my hero," said Simmons, who recorded the video in the United States and added in Hebrew: "My name is Haim. I was born in Haifa."   

Simmons was born Haim Witz in the northern Israeli port city in 1949. He immigrated to the United States at the age of eight with his mother, a survivor of a Nazi concentration camp. He founded the heavy metal band Kiss in the 1970s and became famous for wearing white and black face makeup, spitting fire and sticking his tongue out at sold-out elaborate performances.