Touche'. But check the naming rules anyway, since we did allow for single-name-only people. What we're striving for is to be professional (don't let the moth-eaten moose head fool you), and so we have a certain set of rules which have to take into account that it's a very big world. And it could be worse - so many people in China have the surname "Wang" that they've been forced to go to 3 names!
But in answer to your question: mix JSTL and
JSF at your peril. That's especially true of iterative operations, but it's risky in any case. There are efforts to make the two play better together, but much remains to be done.
You may be attempting to use the wrong approach. For example, instead of a JSTL conditional wrapping of a set of buttons, here's how I handle context-sensitve button display:
JSF is more abstract than JSTL. In most cases, JSF pages should be display-oriented and logic should be handled at the backing bean level.
The secret of how to be miserable is to constantly expect things are going to happen the way that they are "supposed" to happen.
You can have faith, which carries the understanding that you may be disappointed. Then there's being a willfully-blind idiot, which virtually guarantees it.