Aslam Abdullah speaks to the congregation of Jamia Masjid, where he is spiritual director. In addition, he is an author and journalist. Photo by John Gurzinski. Aslam Abdullah has written more than 10 books, including this 2003 volume.

Aslam Abdullah of Las Vegas speaks of a grand vision. He foresees American Muslims one day assuming moral leadership of the Muslim world as a result of high literacy, relative prosperity and -- above all -- experience at operating democratic organizations in the contentious open society of the United States.

He is a constant advocate of peace yet stands accused of spreading radical theories that encourage terrorism.

"This is the country where history lives and history is made," says Abdullah, 49. "So many cultures and so many ethnicities are coming together, not living under the domination of one religion, but in a secular environment where they can express themselves and find a space."

Abdullah pursues this high goal through the diverse and sometimes lowly activities of his hectic daily life.

He is spiritual director at Jamia Masjid, the city's largest mosque, where he preaches, holds youth camps and officiates at weddings and funerals.

He helped launch, and is editor in chief of, The Muslim Observer, a national weekly newspaper out of Michigan.

He has authored more than 10 books, including "The American Muslim Identity, Speaking for Ourselves," published in 2003.

He has accepted a role at a new Muslim think tank in Pakistan, the Iqbal International Institute. The institute will examine Islam in light of modern issues and train young Muslims in critical thinking, says Abdullah, who will head its expected book division from the United States.

And he's a husband, father of four and long-distance commuter because his immediate family still lives in Southern California, where two children still are in school. When he's there on his days off from the Las Vegas mosque, he helps his wife, Amtul, with a small book-distribution business.

In sum, Las Vegans may not instantly know the name Aslam Abdullah. But he is nationally known -- and controversial -- in circles that pay attention to U.S. Muslim thinkers and activists.

Sometimes it seems a no-win situation, as when criticisms fly at Abdullah from opposite ends of the spectrum.

On one hand, fellow Muslims have said he is too hard at times on Islamic organizations or leaders. On the other, Steve Emerson, the non-Muslim author of "American Jihad," claims Abdullah is a "pretend moderate" who puts out dangerous rhetoric.

Take Abdullah's June 6 commentary on the alleged Marine massacre of civilians in Haditha, Iraq. He uses the incident to illustrate anti-Muslim bias.

He likens the Marines to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorists. Both groups committed atrocities. Both claimed they acted to avenge injustices. Then Abdullah contrasts the public response: "In the case of Osama, Islam was declared a villain. In the case of the Marines, personal stress was described as the main reason."

In 2003, Abdullah publicly questioned whether the famous videotapes attributed to Osama Bin Laden were authentic. The U.S. government uses the tapes to cause panic, he claims.

In July, Abdullah published an editorial claiming that U.S. and Israeli foreign policy are determined not by secular considerations but by the intention to fulfill various scriptural prophesies. As a result, Abdullah questions whether the two nations are truly seeking peace in the Middle East.

Abdullah also brands Israel an apartheid state, based on the differing treatment of Jewish and Palestinian residents on property rights and other matters. But the writer claims he's just as tough when it comes to spotting violence or injustice perpetrated by members of his own faith. He has condemned the Sept. 11 attacks, suicide bombings and other acts by Muslims in Afghanistan, Sudan, Iraq and England.

Unlike many spiritual leaders of mosques, Abdullah did not come up through religious ranks. His higher education did not take place at any of the fabled Islamic theological academies. His advanced degrees are, rather, in what might be described as fields of "applied ethics" such as sociology and journalism. His doctorate is in journalism from a secular institution, City University, London.

The cleric was born to poverty as the oldest of 11 children in a family that belongs to India's Muslim minority. When his father died, just as Abdullah was finishing university, he needed to support his widowed mother and the siblings, but he couldn't find anything decent-paying in India. So he went into journalism in 1979, obtaining a job in Saudi Arabia as a reporter for a bureau of the London-based publication "Arabia: Islamic World Review."

"It was banned in most Muslim countries," including Egypt, Indonesia, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, he says of the Review. "We were writing openly against the monarchies," which although Muslim, were not advancing the public health or literacy of the populations they ruled.

The publication shut down in the mid-1980s, so Abdullah moved to the United States and worked as a consultant for several years at the American Islamic College in Chicago.

He and his growing family moved to California in 1989, where he joined the Islamic Center of Southern California, to publish the Minaret, a feisty newsmagazine for Muslims. His editorials drew lightning bolts.

He wrote, for example, against U.S. mosques taking financial support from foreign Muslim groups, including members of royalty, who then impose their own agendas on the recipients. "Their money is dirty money. Their money is not moral," he says, pointing out that Jamia Masjid does not receive funds from overseas.

In 1999, when the Muslim religious police in Afghanistan ordered jail time for men who trimmed their beards, Abdullah protested by shaving his beard off entirely, then editorializing in print against coercion. To strict Muslims, a beard shows devotion to the lifestyle set by Muhammad, the prophet and founder of Islam.

The Muslim Observer is Abdullah's brainchild. A friend, Michigan cardiologist A.S. Nakadar, bankrolled the launch of The Muslim Observer in 1998. Abdullah writes editorials for the weekly but says he doesn't draw a paycheck from it.

Today, the Muslim Observer is going strong, but the Minaret has folded. It had been Abdullah's principal paycheck, so he gratefully joined the paid staff at Jamia Masjid in 2004.

The mosque does not want a traditional imam who does all the preaching. Abdullah shares the pulpit with other scheduled speakers. The mosque monitors closely who is permitted to speak, according to Khalid Khan, board president. "If one person is giving the sermon every week, we have a single track (viewpoint). If we have different people, they come up with different views, different prospects. It is better for us." Sermon topics are normally "issues that we are facing these days: how to raise our kids, how we can be a good person," according to Khan.

Interfaith dialogue is high on Abdullah's community agenda. He believes it gives Muslims chances to do charitable work and breaks down misconceptions about Muslims. To that end, Jamia Masjid last year joined Family Promise, a long-standing network of local churches and other houses of worship that serve homeless families.

"He's got the drive to get out there and educate and enlist" helpers, is how Family Promise director Terry Lindemann describes Abdullah. His social conscience impresses her. "He doesn't have anything to do with terrorism, any more than my father, who was German (American). During World War II, he was afraid they'd think he was with Hitler."

Not everyone views Abdullah as positively as does Lindemann. Emerson told the Review-Journal: "The record of Aslam Abdullah's comments during the past few years demonstrates an ideology of militant Islamic extremism. Pretending to be moderate, his radical agenda typifies the deception of groups ... (that) falsely assert to be nonextremist."

Emerson himself is a controversial figure. He won the prestigious Polk Award for his 1994 documentary "Jihad in America" and has been credited for predicting, in advance of Sept. 11, a major attack on the American homeland by Muslim militants. He has testified before Congress and the 9/11 Commission, and he consulted with several federal agencies. However, some journalism watchdogs charge that Emerson foments anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hysteria. Other Emerson critics point out his errors: He initially theorized that Yugoslavians bombed the World Trade Center in 1993 and that the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing looked like the work of Muslim terrorists.

The cleric remains calm at Emerson's remarks, but they clearly disturb him. "If (I'm) pretending, I hope the pretensions would come out in my 20 years of working with non-Muslims."

A longtime naturalized citizen who votes in California as an independent, Abdullah likes the moral conservatism of Republicans and the social awareness of Democrats. He thinks of himself not as a radical, not even as a liberal, but as a "progressive."

To Emerson, he answers, "The intellectual leaders (in the U.S.), the thought 'processors,' everybody tends to view opposition to Israel as opposition to the United States."

Yes, Abdullah supports Israel's right to exist. That doesn't mean he thinks the United States should tolerate what he perceives as Israel's prolonged mistreatment of Palestinians. Nor does he think the United States should blindly support every military or strategic move Israel makes.

"Why should an American be questioned (on) his loyalty to his country on the basis of his support for Israel?" he asks. "There are thousands of (non-Muslim) Americans who do not identify with the interests of Israel. But they are not described as radicals."

When it comes to "policing" his own mosque for potential terrorists, Abdullah says he would notify homeland security or law enforcement if a person talked about "bombing (a) building," but not if he heard someone say, "I don't like Israel."

Another critic of Abdullah is Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser. An Arizona physician, a former Navy officer and founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, Jasser says he is concerned that Abdullah recklessly mixes religion -- which arises from his mosque post -- with politics, by virtue of his journalism.

Abdullah answers that mixing the two is natural and healthy. He cites Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and James Dobson -- and, of course, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. -- as religious leaders known for doing the same.

"They want me to confine myself to the prayers?" he says. "I don't think a conscious person could be silent on everything going on in the world."