# Christians United for Israel **Christians United for Israel (CUFI)** is the largest pro-Israel organization in the United States by its own count — "over 10 million members," a figure that means e-mail sign-ups rather than dues — founded in 2006 by the San Antonio megachurch pastor [[John Hagee]] to give [[Christian Zionism]] a lobby. Its annual Washington summit puts thousands of evangelicals in congressional offices for a day; its CUFI Action Fund (2015), chaired by Hagee's daughter Sandra Hagee Parker, does the political work; and its theology — that the Jewish return to the land is a precondition of the end times — is the reason the [[Republican Party]]'s most reliable constituency treats unconditional support for Israel as a religious obligation rather than a foreign-policy choice. ## In the Iran war CUFI was the domestic constituency for the [[Iran War 2026]]. Its summit and its members' messaging cast the February 28 strikes as prophecy in motion — Hagee told his congregation after the bombing that it was "refreshing to know that God is in total control" — and its Action Fund had spent the preceding year pressing Congress against any deal that left Tehran's enrichment intact. The administration returned the favor in personnel: a Christian Zionist ambassador in Jerusalem and a Defense Secretary who speaks the same language. When the June 17 memorandum ended the war on terms the movement disliked, CUFI's line was "support Israel today, tomorrow, forever" and its chairwoman's warning that those who "hate Israel and the Jewish people" would need God's mercy — the Hagee register, in which policy disagreement is apostasy. ## Why it matters here CUFI is the largest half of what the vault means by the Israel lobby, and the half most American Jews are not in. Its alliance with the Israeli right is durable because it asks nothing of its partner; its theology anticipates the Jews' conversion or destruction, which Jewish partners have decided not to discuss. The [[Republican Jewish Coalition]] supplies the money and the certification, CUFI supplies the votes, and neither needs the other's reasons — see [[Christian Zionism]] and [[Religions and Right-Wing Politics]]. The [[Christian Right]] page carries the movement CUFI grew out of. ## See Also - [[John Hagee]] · [[Christian Zionism]] · [[Christian Right]] · [[Religious Right]] · [[Republican Party]] - [[Republican Jewish Coalition]] · [[AIPAC]] · [[Israel]] · [[Iran War 2026]] · [[Religions and Right-Wing Politics]]