(CNN) One of the survivors of the New York Hanukkah celebration stabbings was hit in the side of the head by the suspect's machete and doctors had to use three staples to close his wounds, Rabbi Shmuel Gancz told CNN.

Shloime Rottenberg, the son of Rabbi Chaim Rottenberg, had just finished the ceremony of lighting the menorah at his father's upstate New York home when the attack started, Gancz said.

"They are grateful for what they deem a minor injury considering where else the machete could have hit him, such as his eyes," Gancz said of Rottenberg and his family.

The suspect, Grafton Thomas, has been accused of wounding five people with a machete during the Hanukkah celebration last weekend. Thomas, 37, pleaded not guilty to five counts of attempted murder Sunday. A day later, he was charged by federal agents with obstruction of free exercise of religious beliefs involving an attempt to kill -- a federal hate crime. A judge ordered him to be detained.

Tuesday, federal authorities impounded a car that Thomas' mother dropped off at a body shop last week, said Gerry Galiger, the owner and operator of Finesse Auto Body in Greenwood Lake, New York.

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