The snafus over the June 27 event was fraught with ironies and illustrates both the jitteriness at Justice over Gonzales's political standing as well as the pitfalls that sometimes plague the department's Muslim outreach programs. Most law-enforcement officials consider those programs, designed to foster better cooperation with the Muslim-American community, to be critical efforts to identify and prosecute terrorists inside the country.

The very same day as the postponed Justice event, for example, President Bush conducted a similar Muslim outreach event, giving a major speech at the rededication of the Islamic Center in Washington. In the address, the president announced the administration's plans to appoint a special envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference--the first time the U.S. government has ever done so. Among the invited guests at that event was Northern Virginia imam Mohamed Magid, the vice president of ISNA, and the very same official whose scheduled presence at the Justice event triggered concerns that it could cause problems for Gonzales. Also invited to the Islamic Center event--and cleared by the White House for attendance--was Ibrahim Hooper, communications director for the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), another organization recently branded by prosecutors as a Muslim Brotherhood affiliate and named to the unindicted co-conspirator list in the Holy Land case.

In fact, Justice officials readily acknowledge they have no evidence that Magid is linked to terrorism or committed any crime--and one senior official pointed out that the Sudanese-born imam did not even become an officer of ISNA until last year, well after the events at issue in the Holy Land case. Although it has sometimes been derided by critics for promoting a conservative Wahabi brand of Islam, the Plainfield, Ind.-based ISNA describes itself as a nationwide group aimed at "supporting Muslim communities" and "fostering good relations with other religious communities."

In a brief telephone interview with NEWSWEEK Wednesday, Magid pointed a reporter to an e-mail statement saying that the ISNA was seeking an immediate retraction of the government's "unfounded allegations" in the Holy Land case. "ISNA is not now and has never been involved in any covert or illegal activity and has never supported any terrorist organizations," the statement read. "Rather, ISNA is an open and transparent membership organization that strives to be an exemplary and unifying Islamic organization … ISNA hereby reaffirms its unqualified condemnation of all acts of terrorism."

Hooper, the CAIR spokesman, also denounced the listing of his group as an "unindicted co-conspirator" of the Holy Land Foundation, calling it "completely unjustified." He added: "When you're named in this way, you have no legal recourse."

According to one senior law-enforcement official (who asked not to be named talking about an ongoing case), the listing of ISNA, CAIR and other groups as "unindicted co-conspirators" was largely a tactical move by the government. By listing the groups, the official said, it makes it easier for prosecutors to introduce documents, tapes and other evidence mentioning them and which relate to what the government charges is a wide-ranging conspiracy to raise money in the United States in support of Hamas. (Even though Hamas leaders last year won elections and now effectively run Gaza, the group remains a U.S.-designated terrorist organization.)