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I think this is Poker's latest on Yazid Sufaat, at his website:

"Participants at a key meeting in Kuala Lumpur in January 2000 included regional Al Qaeda operative Hambali, two of the 9/11 hijackers (Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid Almidhar), Cole planner Tawfiq bin Attash, and others. According to some reports, Khalid Mohammed was also there. Tawfiq Bin Attash was a long time Bin Laden operative. The Yemeni first went to Afghanistan in 1989. He came to lead Bin Laden's bodyguards and was an intermediary between Bin Laden and those who carried out the bombing of the Cole in October 2000. Khalid Almihdhar, one of the 9/11 hijackers, was from Saudi Arabia but was a Yemeni national. Almihdhar was named an unindicted co-conspirator in the indictment against Zacarias Moussaoui.

Zacarias Moussaoui was alleged to have received his money from Yazid Sufaat, under the cover of a company managed by his wife named Infocus Tech, an importer of US computer software and hardware. Sufaat, who was arrested upon returning from Afghanistan to Malaysia where he had been serving in a Taliban medical brigade, graduated from California State University, Sacramento in 1987. He received a bachelors degree in biological sciences, concentrating on clinical laboratory technology, with a minor in chemistry. Sufaat joined the Malaysian army, where he was a lab technician assigned to a medical brigade. After five years, he left the service with the rank of captain and worked for a civilian laboratory. In August 1993, he set up his own company, Green Laboratory Medicine.

After authorities found a letter signed by Yazid Sufaat purporting to authorize Zacarias Moussaoui as its marketing representative, they went looking for Sufaat. But by then, Sufaat had left for Pakistan and Afghanistan. According to his wife, he went to Pakistan in June 2001 because he wanted to do his doctorate in pathology at the University of Karachi. According to his wife, Sejarhtul Dursina, "He had planned to set up a medical support unit in Afghanistan, near Kandahar." (Kandahar is where Al Qaeda established its anthrax lab.) Dursina had attended Sacramento State with him. It was her mother who encouraged Yazid's religious studies.

According to Malaysian officials, Sufaat merely was a foot soldier who provided housing and false identification letters and helped obtain explosives. "I would put it this way: If Hambali [Al Qaeda's point man in Southeast Asia] was the travel agent, Sufaat was the guy at the airport holding up the sign." Sufaat admits to having purchased 4 tons of ammonium nitrate to build a truck bomb for the Singapore cell. The ammonium nitrate eventually was found buried throughout the grounds of a plantation.

The Malaysian officials report that they believe that Sufaat had no knowledge of what the hijackers who stayed at his condominium or Zacarias were planning. At a minimum, however, the established facts relevant to the Amerithrax investigation show that in the Summer and Fall of 2001 an Al Qaeda supporter who had assisted in the 9-11 operation -- and who was a lab technician working with anthrax -- was in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Was he the fellow perceived as Filipino who the journalist met in Afghanistan in the Fall of 2001 bragging about his ability to manipulate anthrax? The authorities may not think so given the comments of Malaysian officials and Sufaat's attorney's description of the 30-minute FBI interrogation (where they mainly wanted to know how he knew Zacarias). The U.S. has asked for his extradition in connection with hosting of the two 9/11 hijackers, but at last report, Malaysia had refused.

The connection between the folks in Karachi and the operatives in Kuala Lumpur was clarified and confirmed by the arrest in May 2002 of Mohammed Monsour Jabarah. This young man told interrogators that the codeword for Americans was "White Meat," suggesting unclean pork. He was a go-between Khalid Mohammed in Karachi and Hambali in Kuala Lumpur. He delivered the money for the bombing attacks planned for Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines. Arrested in March 2002, he had joined Al Qaeda in May 2001.

In his interrogation, the Catholic-schooled youth, said that KSM had asked him to "go to Malaysia to meet with individuals who were planning an operation against the US and Israeli embassies in the Philippines." Osama Bin Laden, with whom he met, valued the youth for his clean Canadian passport and fluency in English. KSM told the young man that he must leave Karachi to deliver the money to Hambali, Al Qaeda's point man in Southeast Asia and the military chief for Jemiah Islamiyah, before September 11. He flew out to deliver the money on September 10, 2001.

Hambali earlier had met with Mohammed Mansour Jabarah in Karachi in August 2001. Jabarah is cooperating and is available to testify in an Amerithrax prosecution. Documents relating to Jabarah's brother's role were found in May 2003 upon a raid in Riyadh that foiled an attempt that preceded the bombing of several residential compounds. The picture of his home in St. Catherines, Ontario, bringing to mind the movie "Arlington Road" about the terrorist who lived next door.

Hambali was arrested in mid-August 2003 in Thailand. His wife, Lee, an ethnic Chinese Malaysian who converted to Islam, was also detained. Given that Hambali reportedly set up a meeting with two of the 9/11 hijackers and was the one who recruited Yazid Sufaat, the Malaysian lab technician reportedly engaged in anthrax R&D, the arrest bodes well for the prospect of a successful resolution of the Amerithrax matter. He eventually began providing information about Al Qaeda's anthrax production program.

Other good news came when it was announced -- or at least reported -- that the second in command of Egyptian Islamist Jihad after Zawahiri, Shehata, is one of the detainees in Iran. Given the important role he allegedly played in supporting operations, his arrest may be very significant to resolution of the Amerithrax matter (along with Hambali's). He reportedly was in charge of the Jihad’s security committee, which provides logistics to the military wing, special operations and individuals involved in attacks. Al Qaeda's military operations chief, an Egyptian named Adel, recently advised sympathizers not to believe reports of the arrest of other cell members. He may very well be right --and indeed some reports had Adel arrested.

In any event, Shehata, whether detained in Iran or not, was born in the Egyptian city of Zagazig in 1960 and became involved in Islamic movements when he joined law school in Zagazig University. In 1984, he shared an office with Attorney Zayat, who has represented both the blind sheik and Zawahiri. Al Zayat was the attorney in 1999 who had said that Zawahiri could be expected to use biological weapons in light of the extradition pressure its leaders faced.

The sheer variety of arrests -- with the resulting ability to corroborate (or not) the information given -- may in the end be enough to crack the Amerithrax mystery.