Ilan Shohat

Ilan Shohat (; born 21 September 1974) is an Israeli politician, and the mayor of Safed in the Israeli Galilee since 2008.

In 2010, he was the youngest mayor in Israel. In 2015, he was elected to the Knesset, but chose not to take his seat days before he was to be sworn in. He lost his bid for re-election in 2018.

Biography Ilan Shohat was born in Safed to a Tunisian-Jewish family. He was named after his aunt Ilana Neeman, who was murdered in the Maalot massacre – the May 1974 terrorist massacre of 22 children and three adults in a Ma'a lot school by armed members of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine. He is secular. He was a representative of an independent list identified with Kadima and was supported by Yisrael Beiteinu and the Labor Party. In 2010 Shohat was Israel's youngest mayor. In December 2014 he indicated that though he considers "the absorption of the wounded Syrians a moral and Jewish obligation of the first degree", he wanted the Israeli Health Ministry to, instead of directing wounded Syrians to hospitals in the North of Israel that are facing financial issues, send them to better-equipped hospitals in central Israel.

He ran for local office in Safed as a member of the Likud and also ran for the head of Kadima. He joined Yisrael Beiteinu in 2012.

Election to the Israeli Knesset Shohat won a seat in the Israeli Knesset in 2015 when he was in the fourth slot on the Yisrael Beiteinu list for the 2015 Knesset elections. His party received six seats in the election. His decision permitted MK Robert Ilatov (the next in line on the Yisrael Beiteinu list) to remain in the Knesset.

2018 election On 30 October 2018, Shohat lost his bid for re-election as Mayor of Safed.