At the age of 3, his family moved to Ramat Gan, and He attended Yitzhak Rabin Tichon Hadash High School in Ramat Gan[7] In 1998, Shmuli enlisted in the Israel Defense Force Armored Corps and served as a tank commander of the 7th Armored Brigade's 82nd Battalion in Israel and Lebanon.

In that position, he led a campaign against the Shochat Committee, which sought to privatize higher education and raise tuition fees.

Key reforms included increasing contract workers into higher education institutions and advocating for community service requirements for undergraduate courses.

As chairman, he served on the Council for Higher Education and directed other National Union of Israeli Students ventures including Issta Lines touring company.

In the 19th Knesset, Shmuli served as a member of the Economic Affairs Committee and participated in bills to improve equality for veterans, promote financial education and subsidised housing.

In July 2015, following a stabbing incident at Jerusalem's gay pride parade, Shmuli wrote in an article to Yedioth Ahronoth that "when the knife is raised around the neck of an entire LGBT community, my community, it will not stop there";[17] in this article, he became the first Knesset Member who came out of the closet during his term.

To aid with retraining of skilled labour, Shmuli allocated an additional $300M NIS to vocational training systems.

He also initiated programs to improve health and social access to the LGBTQ community, opening 6 outreach centres.

[20] In February 2021 After the election of Merav Michaeli as chair of the Labour Party, Shmuli announced that he was resigning from the Knesset and ministerial roles to take a break from politics, stating that it had been a mistake to join the Netanyahu government.