Apocalypse meow: ISIS issues a fatwa on cat breeders living within their ‘caliphate’ and begins searching houses for kittens in Mosul 

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Jihadi fighters are hunting down kittens in the Iraqi city of Mosul after a fatwa on cat-breeders was issued by senior ISIS clerics.

The new law forbids the indoor breeding of cats inside the Islamic State's 'caliphate' and claims to be in line with the jihadists' "vision, ideology and beliefs".

Residents of the northern Iraqi city of Mosul were warned not to violate the ban which was declared on Tuesday, as ISIS fighters began searching their houses for kittens, Iraqi News reported.

ISIS claim the decree is in line with their "vision, ideology and beliefs" but jihadists regularly post pictures of themselves with kittens

The Islamic State of Cat twitter account showed fighters feeding and playing with kittens in a bid to attract more recruits

The purge will come as a surprise to many after the terrorist group deliberately posted pictures of kittens on social media in a bid to attract new breed of young fighters.

A UN report in 2014 showed thousands of jihadists had flocked to Iraq and Syria after seeing pictures of cats posed alongside AK-47s and in the arms of masked terrorists. 15,000 fighters from 80 countries joined the fight after seeing their posts on social media.

The move was a deliberate attempt to groom youngsters into joining the terrorist group, said the report. ISIS understand and recognise 'the terror and recruitment value of multi-channel, multi-language social and other media messaging,' it said, adding that by embracing the cat craze, they were attempting to show a more 'cosmopolitan' side. 

Embracing the internet cat craze was an attempt to make the terrorist group appear 'cosmopolitan' but now they've banned cat-breeding

In 2014 the UN reported that 15,000 fighters from 80 countries flocked to Iraq and Syria to join ISIS after seeing their posts on social media

Recognising 'the terror and recruitment value of multi-channel, multi-language social and other media messaging,' helped the terrorists attract a new breed of young fighters

One twitter account, The Islamic State of Cat, showed ISIS fighters feeding and playing with kittens, as well as sick photographs of the cats surrounded by guns and grenades.

Last year prolific British ISIS recruiter Omar Hussein posted pictures of his pet alongside propaganda images and advice about how to join the Islamic State group.

In one his grey cat, named Lucy, was shown curled up inside a suicide belt. Below the shot Hussein - who once worked as a security guard at Morrisons' supermarket in Buckinghamshire - wrote 'Come closer and I'll blow the entire house down!' 

Omar Hussein posted pictures of his pet alongside propaganda images and advice about how to join the Islamic State group

Underneath one picture of 'Lucy' the cat sitting inside a suicide belt Hussein wrote 'Come closer and I'll blow the entire house down!'

But many of the terrorists seem to be genuine feline fans. In 2015 Dutch jihadist Israfil Yilmaz, 28, became an overnight heart-throb after he posted pictures of himself holding a ginger kitten. 

The terrorist, who was reportedly killed in an airstrike in Raqqa last month, received 10,000 marriage proposals after posting the images with the caption "Soft towards the creation of Allah but fierce and harsh towards the disbelievers." 

Israfil Yilmaz received marriage proposals after posting a picture of himself holding an adorable ginger kitten

A fatwa is a legal decree issued by a specialist in Islamic law. ISIS relies on a central committee to issue fatwas which is comprised of influential clerics and figures working for the group.

Earlier this year jihadis operating in the 'Euphrates provice' in Iraq and Syria declared an embargo on the common practice of breeding of pigeons on rooftops, claiming the sight 'reveals the genitals' which is an idiom used to indicate dishonorable activity. Local pigeon breeders were told they had one week to get rid of the pigeons or face public flogging.