ISLAMIC State (Isis) fighters slaughtered around 40 people yesterday in a raid on a village in Syria’s central Hama province.

Both state sources and opposition activists confirmed the brutal assault on government-held Mabuja.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that the extremists had shot, burned or stabbed to death 37 civilians before the Syrian army forced them to flee.

This attack comes a week after an Isis video showed its fighters beheading eight men said to be Shi’ite Muslims from Hama.

Various religious groups have long lived together peacefully in Hama.

Communities in central Syria largely back President Bashar al-Assad and fear attacks by the mostly Sunni rebels trying to overthrow his government.

Isis grew along with the rest of the armed opposition to Mr Assad and now controls about a third of the country, mostly in the north and east.