American Christian Zionist umbrella group Christians United for Israel (CUFI) sent a letter to US President George W. Bush earlier this week insisting that he stop pressuring Israel to surrender its biblical heartland for the creation of yet another Arab Muslim state.

The letter, which was released to the press on Tuesday, noted that “land-for-peace is a failed policy of the past that has produced nothing but more war.”

Israeli opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu, who is close to CUFI director Pastor John Hagee, recently voiced a similar position, pointing out that “the withdrawal from Gaza two years ago proved that any Israeli withdrawal, particularly a unilateral one, does not advance peace but establishes a terror base for radical Islam.”

The CUFI letter, which was signed by 51 Evangelical leaders, reached the White House just one day before an opposing message signed by 30 heads of Christian seminaries and ministries arrived.

The second letter was also published in the New York Times in an effort to “correct a serious misperception among some people including some US policymakers that all American evangelicals are opposed to a two-state solution and creation of a new Palestinian state that includes the vast majority of the West Bank.”