The invention concerns E2F oligonucleotide decoy molecules with improved properties. In particular, the invention concerns a double-stranded E2F decoy oligodeoxynucleotide (dsODN) molecule comprising a core sequence that is capable of specific binding to an E2F transcription factor, flanked by 5′ and 3′ sequences, wherein (i) the core sequence consists of about 5 to 12 base pairs; (ii) the molecule comprises an about 12 to 28 base-pair long double-stranded region composed of two fully complementary strands; and (iii) the E2F dsODN binds to said E2F transcription factor with a binding affinity that is at least about 5-fold of the binding affinity of a reference decoy molecule shown in FIG. 1 (SEQ ID NOS: 1 and 2), as determined by a competitive gel mobility shift binding assay performed on nuclear extract from THP-1 cells.