Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - A group of Islamist militants fighting in Syria posted a series of photographs of a man having his hand cut off in a live-on Twitter, the Daily Mail reported on Friday.

Apparently carried out in the northern town of Maskanah, near Aleppo, the live-feed amputation was re-tweeted by other Jihadist social media channels.

According to the responsible group, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, the man was a thief and had requested to be punished by having his had cut off.

According to the Daily Mail, it was not immediately possible to verify his alleged guilt and the photographs and accompanying tweets have now been removed from Twitter.

One photo showed a blindfolded man whose hand was held down on a table by militants as a sword was held to his right hand.

A later photograph shows the man with his limb severed and the table splashed with blood.

The Twitter account by which the photos were posted has now been suspended from the social networking site.

In early January, a coalition of Islamist and moderate rebels angered by ISIS’s abuses of civilians and rival opposition fighters began attacking the group.

*Alarabiya