Attributes in JSP tag libraries in general can be either static or resolved at request time. If they are resolved at request time the JSP will resolve their value at runtime and pass the output on to the tag. This means you can put pretty much any JSP code into the attribute and the tag will behave accordingly to what output that produces.
If you look at the jstl taglib docs you can see which attributes are reuest time and which are not. http://java.sun.com/products/jsp/jstl/1.1/docs/tlddocs/index.html