DUBAI (AFP) - Some 170 Muslim scholars, thinkers and politicians called Saturday for backing the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples in the face of Israeli onslaughts and urged Arab and Muslim rulers to cut any ties with Israel.

"We call on all the Muslim and Arab peoples to stand by their brethren in Palestine and Lebanon and ... support them by all moral and material means available and in keeping with Islamic rules," they said in a statement.

The statement, signed by 169 preachers, academics and Islamist politicians from Arab and Muslim countries, expressed "full support for the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples" as they confront Israel's offensives in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.

Calling for Muslims from all sects to close ranks and cast aside any differences, the signatories urged Arab and Muslim governments to "disavow any political or economic ties ... with the Israeli enemy and to drop any illusions of peace with (Israel) and which have brought our nation nothing but killing, destruction and shame."

The statement said Muslim rulers should obey edicts by religious authorities "prohibiting recognition of the Zionist state or the surrender of one inch of Palestine" to Israel. Muslim and Arab governments "should free themselves from subservience except to God" and link their relations with the rest of the world, chiefly the United States and the United Nations, to those sides' "stands toward our causes, chiefly the Palestinian cause."

Israel "could not have continued to exist and engage in aggression had it not been for massive American support, which has reached an unprecedented level of insolence and ... contempt for our nation," the statement said.

The signatories called on "wise Jews in the world and the wise and free among the American people ... not to allow your reckless (rulers) to .... destroy your future relations with the Muslim peoples.

"We are advocates of freedom, justice and ... peace, and we stretch out our hands to anyone who believes in this," the statement said.

Saudi preacher Awadh al-Qarni, one of the signatories, told AFP the statement has been sent to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the Arab League and the European Union.

He said all the signatories, who include senior officials from Islamist parties and other politicians such as Palestinian Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniya, are Sunni Muslims.

The signatories came from Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, the Palestinian territories, Pakistan, Indonesia, Bosnia and Senegal among others.