FILE - This undated file photo released by Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Interior on Sunday, Oct. 31, 2010, purports to show Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri. Al-Asiri is the chief bombmaker for al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, responsible for building the underwear bomb used to try to bring down a Detroit-bound jetliner on Christmas 2009 and the printer-cartridge bombs intercepted in U.S.-bound cargo planes a year later. U.S. intelligence officials say he has resurfaced recently in Yemen, after months in hiding following the death by drone strike of American-born firebrand AQAP cleric Anwar al-Awlaki last fall. (AP Photo/Saudi Arabia Ministry of Interior, File)

The terror threat emanating from al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen has focused attention on the group’s cunning leader, Nasir al-Wuhayshi. And for good reason. Wuhayshi, who was personally groomed by Osama bin Laden, is said to be a highly effective organizer and charismatic leader in the mold of his now-deceased mentor. Recently, Wuhayshi was elevated to the No. 2 position in al Qaeda’s core organization, even while running AQAP. But despite Wuhayshi’s growing stature among terror masterminds, no AQAP operative worries the United States more than Ibrahim al-Asiri, the group’s diabolically clever bombmaker, according to two U.S. counterterrorism officials.

Al-Asiri, a drop-out chemistry student from Saudi Arabia who was radicalized after the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, has proved uniquely adept at devising bombs that can elude even the most sophisticated forms of detection. He rose to prominence in 2009 after a suicide bomber nearly succeeded in killing Saudi prince Muhammed Bin Nayef. Al-Asiri had devised the bomb used in the assassination attempt. The attacker was his own brother. Early reports indicated that the bomb was implanted in the younger al-Asiri’s rectum, but it turned out that it had been sewn into his underwear. Al-Asiri absorbed most of the blast, which killed him instantly. Bin Nayef managed to escape with only minor injuries. Still, the fact that an al Qaeda operative was able to penetrate Saudi security and come some close to killing one of the kingdom’s top counterterrorism officials spooked American officials. A few days later, John Brennan traveled to Saudi Arabia to learn about the attack and the innovative bomb that had been used.

Only four months later, AQAP struck again—this time with a new version of the same kind of bomb. A Nigerian AQAP recruit came perilously close to blowing up a commercial airliner over Detroit. The device was traced back to al-Asiri. In 2010, AQAP managed to place bombs in two U.S. cargo planes. The explosive material was ingeniously placed in printer ink cartridges where the ink powder normally goes. It was, once again, the devilish handiwork of al-Asiri. A Saudi tipster helped foil the plot.

For U.S. intelligence officials, there was nothing reassuring about the fact that al-Asiri had yet to successfully pull off any major attacks. They attributed it to pure luck. “We felt like we were cheating fate,” says one U.S. intelligence official. “The question was: would we get him before he got us?” Al-Asiri would soon move to the top of the Obama administration’s kill or capture list.

Few things chilled U.S. officials more than the belief that al-Asiri has succeeded in developing a new kind of bomb that can be surgically implanted inside the human body. The military refers to such a weapon as a “surgically implanted improvised explosive device,” or SIIED. In 2011, U.S. intelligence learned that al-Asiri was working closely with AQAP-affiliated doctors who had tested the bomb on dogs and other animals. Like his previous bombs, it contained no metal and so could pass through conventional detectors.

America Hunts Al Qaeda BombmakerPlay video."

Last year, U.S. intelligence officials circulated a secret report that laid out in vivid detail how al-Asiri and his doctors had developed the surgical technique. A source familiar with the report described it as 15 to 20 pages, single spaced, and replete with pictures and schematics. “It was almost like something you’d see in Scientific American,” the source said.

President Obama has received regular updates on al-Asiri’s progress and has been involved in numerous discussions about killing or otherwise neutralizing the bombmaker, according to a senior administration official who declined to be named discussing sensitive national security matters.

The CIA may have gotten close to taking out al-Asiri in the spring of 2012. Prince Bin Nayef hatched a plan to retaliate against his would-be killer. According to author and Yemen expert Gregory Johnsen, bin Nayef turned to British intelligence and the CIA to help mount a sting operation using a Saudi national who’d been recruited by the British as bait. The undercover agent successfully penetrated the AQAP, a major intelligence coup, though he was never able to meet directly with al-Asiri. Another AQAP operative gave the mole a new, more sophisticated, version of the underwear bomb along with instructions to get on a plane from a safe airport. Instead, the agent was able to give the bomb to his Saudi handler in Yemen who spirited it out of the country on his private plane.

A few days later, an Associated Press story reported that Western intelligence agencies had foiled an AQAP plot. The article indicated that the CIA had obtained the explosive device, thereby revealing that a spy had likely penetrated AQAP.

Some U.S. officials have suggested that the leak to the AP might have disrupted the best chance the U.S. had to take out al-Asiri, though it is unclear how the operation would have been pulled off once the mole had left the country on a supposed suicide mission.

The CIA’s quest to kill AQAP’s master bomber goes on. Last year a CIA drone strike took out Ahmed Said Saad, a Syrian medical doctor who had been working with al-Asiri on his experiments. On more than one occasion over the past few months, U.S. counterterrorism operators thought they had al-Asiri in their crosshairs. But a senior U.S. official says he has eluded American drones and remains on the loose.

Related from The Daily Beast

Like us on Facebook - Follow us on Twitter - Sign up for The Cheat Sheet Newsletter

By Zachary Fagenson

MIAMI BEACH, Florida (Reuters) - Miami Beach, Florida, police are investigating the death of an 18-year-old graffiti artist who died after being shot with a Taser during a pre-dawn chase with officers who said they caught him spray-painting a building.

Israel Hernandez-Llach, known by his so-called tag name as "Reefa," won notice for his graffiti work as well as for sculpture and painting.

"He did it a lot," said Hernandez-Llach's friend Rafael Lynch, referring to his graffiti. "He wasn't a bad person at all; the cops didn't like him or what he looked like," he added, saying his friend was also an avid skateboarder.

The two hung out at a Miami Beach skateboard shop where Lynch works.

Graffiti Artist Dies After Being Tasered By Miami …Play video."

"To me, right now, he's still here. I hung out with him so much I couldn't imagine him dead," Lynch said.

Miami Beach Police Chief Raymond Martinez said Hernandez-Llach fled after being seen "vandalizing private property" shortly before dawn on Tuesday in Miami Beach.

He was chased by police and ignored commands to stop running, at which point an officer used his Taser electroshock gun, Martinez said in a statement.

Once in custody, the Colombian-born artist "displayed signs of medical duress" and was pronounced dead soon after.

"At this time, the cause of death has not been determined by the medical examiner's office. Autopsy and toxicology results are still pending as well," Martinez said, while offering condolences to the artist's family.

View gallery."

FILE- In this Thursday, June 30, 2011 file photo, Philipe Almeida takes a picture of a graffiti cove …

(Reporting by Zachary Fagenson; Writing by David Adams; Editing by Kevin Gray, Andrew Hay and Steve Orlosk

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) -- Officials in Kenya investigating the massive airport fire that gutted the arrival hall at Nairobi's main airport said Thursday that first responders looted electronics, a bank and an ATM during and after the blaze.

The officials said first responders stole electronics and money from an ATM. Another official said that police guarding the site overnight attempted to a take a safe from a bank in the burned-out arrivals hall, which also houses several foreign currency exchange shops.

All four officials who described the alleged looting are close to the investigation. They insisted on anonymity because they weren't authorized to share the information before the investigation is complete.

The fire-fighting response to Wednesday's inferno was criticized as slow and inadequate, but the officials could not definitely say the looting was carried out by firefighters. One official said there was now behind-the-scenes finger pointing taking place between the police, fire department and army. Another official said specialized police units had attempted to steal the safe overnight.

The criminal investigations policeman for the airport, Joseph Ngisa, said he hasn't received formal complaints of theft and that police are waiting for affected institutions to report what they lost in the fire.

All public servants in Kenya, including police, firefighters and soldiers, are poorly paid and frequently accused of corruption. Police officers who guard the entrance to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport are well known in Nairobi for demanding bribes from taxi drivers and other vehicles with Kenyan drivers.

International flights, meanwhile, resumed Thursday as officials improvised immigration and luggage routines.

Kenyan officials, assisted by members of the FBI, investigated the cause of the fire. One of the security officials who spoke to AP said the investigation had ruled out terrorism and was now trying to determine if the fire was intentional or accidental.

Michael Kamau, the cabinet secretary for transport and infrastructure, said Kenyan officials were receiving assistance from international agencies "because we intend to carry out a full investigation on what happened yesterday." One of the officials who spoke to AP confirmed that members of the FBI were assisting.

Kamau said the design of the airport — constructed in the mid-1970s — made it challenging for firefighters to access certain areas with water hoses. Kamau said he was "satisfied" by the response of firefighters from private companies but did not mention the airport firefighters, who responded slowly and whose equipment wasn't fully functioning.

Jomo Kenyatta International Airport is East Africa's largest aviation hub, and the fire disrupted air travel across the continent as the airport canceled all international flights Wednesday. Many inbound flights were diverted to Tanzania and the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa. Domestic flights were being operated from the airport's cargo terminal.

Firefighters were desperately short of equipment Wednesday. The airport has fire trucks but some were not filled with water and personnel couldn't be found to drive others. At one point while battling the blaze men in government uniforms lined up to pass buckets of water to fight the fire.

No serious injuries were reported.

President Barack Obama called Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta to offer U.S. support. The fire broke out on the 15th anniversary of U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 people in total, mostly Kenyans, but also a dozen Americans.

Nairobi is the capital of East Africa's largest economy, but public-sector services such as police and fire departments are hobbled by small budgets, corrupt money managers and outdated equipment or an absence of equipment.

First responders steal ATM during airport fire

The massive blaze at Kenya's largest airport provided an opening for a surprising group of looters. Report: Police tried to steal safe