(, born
14 June 1936 ) is a former
Israel i politician who twice served as
Minister Of Finance .
Shochat was born in
Tel Aviv during the
Mandate Era . After his
National Service , in which he served as a corporal in the
Nahal paratroopers, he attended the
Technion , where he gained a BSc in engineering, also being elected chairman of the university's Student Union during his studies.
He moved to the
Negev and was one of the founders of the city of
Arad in 1962. He worked as branch director of Solel Boneh in Arad and the
Dead Sea area and was a member of the Board of Directors of
Israel Aircraft Industries and Negev Phosphates.
In 1967 Shochat became mayor of Arad. In addition to his mayoral duties he was also deputy chairman of the Union of Local Authorities, chairman of the Development Towns Committee of the Union of Local Authorities.
In the
1984 Knesset Elections he was on the
Alignment 's Knesset list, but failed to win a seat. However, when
Aharon Harel resigned from the Knesset in May 1988, Shochat replaced him. He retained his seat in elections in November that year, and was became chairman of the Finance Committee and the Economic Affairs Committee. After being re-elected in 1992 (by which time the Alignment had become the
Labour Party ), he was appointed
Minister Of Finance by
Yitzhak Rabin . Although he was re-elected again in 1996, the opposition
Likud won the election and Shochat lost his ministerial position.
Following victory for
Ehud Barak and
One Israel (an alliance of Labour,
Meimad and
Gesher ) in 1999, Shochat was once again appointed Minister of Finance. In October 2000 he was also made Minister of National Infrastructure replacing
Eliyahu Suissa after
Shas left Barak's coalition. After
Ariel Sharon won
Special Elections For Prime Minister in 2001, Shochat left the cabinet. In the
2003 Elections he also lost his Knesset seat.
After leaving the Knesset, Shochat was commissioned to produce a report on tuition fees for Israeli university students. His report, published in July 2007, recommended raising fees for
Bachelor's Degree s by 70% and increasing government funding for higher education by NIS 1.5 billion.
Shochat: University tuition hike will help reverse brain drain Haaretz, 16 July 2007
