Career
Born in Stanyslaviv in Austria–Hungary (today Ivano-Frankivsk in Ukraine, from 1919 to 1939 in Poland), Surkis made aliyah to Mandatory Palestine in 1933. In 1951 he became head of Kfar Saba local council, becoming the city"s first mayor in 1962, a position he held until 1965. Between 1959 and 1965 he also chaired the Local Government Association.
Later in the year he was elected to the Knesset on the Rafi list.
He retained his seat in the 1969 elections, by which time Rafi had merged into the Alignment, but lost his seat in the 1973 elections. He died in 1995 at the age of 87.