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British female jihadis are running an ultra-religious police force that punishes women for un-Islamic behaviour in territory controlled by Islamist terrorists, The Sunday Telegraph can disclose.

New evidence shows a number of British female recruits to the Al-Khanssaa brigade, an all-women militia set up by the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham (ISIS).

The Al-Khanssaa brigade is operating in Raqqa, the city where ISIS has set up its Syrian headquarters.

Security services believe that the American hostages James Foley and Steven Sotloff were both beheaded in the desert surrounding Raqqa. It is possible that the British women involved in the Al-Khanssaa brigade will know the identity of the man – nicknamed “Jihadi John” and thought to be from south-east England – who executed them.

A key figure in the Al-Khanssaa brigade, according to researchers at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalization (ICSR), based at King’s College London, is Aqsa Mahmood, a 20-year-old woman from Glasgow who fled to Syria in November last year.

Academics have identified three other women – all from the UK – who are members of the brigade. In all, ICSR believes about 60 British women have gone to Syria for jihad. The ICSR has a database of 25 British women it monitors.

The vast majority of the women who have gone to Syria are aged between 18 and 24, with dozens more making inquiries about jihad in the past three weeks following the beheading of Mr. Foley.

Mahmood, who was educated at private school and had wanted to be a doctor, is linked to the Al-Khanssaa brigade through her jihadi name Umm Layth, which she uses on social network sites. The ICSR research team has linked Umm Layth to at least three other women – Umm Haritha, Umm Ubaydiah and Umm Waqqas – all from Britain but whose true identities are not clear. Umm Ubaydiah, who also has Swedish connections, is thought to run the social networking account for Al-Khanssaa.

In one Internet posting at the end of last month, Umm Waqqas describes the other women as “her sisters” and links them to the Al-Khanssaa brigade.

Another cluster of four British women have used Twitter to express interest in joining the brigade. Those women are also living in Raqqa. One of them, known as Umm Farriss and who arrived in Syria in February, posted online a picture of her suicide belt, the first evidence that British woman are being armed with bombs.

Under the ISIS interpretation of Islamic law, women are not permitted to fight, but they are allowed to engage in suicide bombings.

According to the Terrorism Research and Analysis Consortium (Trac), a U.S.-based monitoring group, Al-Khanssaa was set up by ISIS commanders in February. Its members are all single women, who dress in black robes and wear a face veil. Brigade members are paid a monthly salary of 25,000 Syrian pounds – about $175.

Their duties include the strict enforcement of sharia law dress code as well as searching burka-clad women to ensure they are not enemy fighters in disguise.

Melanie Smith, a research associate at ICSR, said: “Al-Khanssaa is a sharia law police brigade. This is

It is thought that the British women are being given key roles in the brigade because they are considered the most committed of the foreign female jihadis.

Al-Khanssaa patrols walk the streets of Raqqa seeking out inappropriate mixing of the sexes and anyone engaging in Western culture. Miss Smith said: “The British women are some of the most zealous in imposing the IS AP Photo/ Raqqa Media Centre of the Islamic State group

Many of the women heading for Syria had gone there to find a husband among the jihadi fighters. Ms. Smith says jihadi social media is “buzzing” with marriage proposals and many fighters have taken several wives.

The British researchers believe that the 16-year-old twins from Manchester who travelled to Syria are now living with fighter husbands. Salma and Zahra Halane, who have 28 GCSEs between them, arrived in Raqqa in June.

Mahmood, the former private schoolgirl, is typical of the impressionable young women who have turned to jihad and married a fighter in Syria. The move has left her parents heartbroken.

But their plea for her to come home will likely fall on deaf ears. Before crossing the border into Syria, she made one last phone call to her parents. “I will see you on the day of judgment,” she told them. “I will take you to Heaven, I will hold your hand.

“I want to become a martyr.”