Authorities are negotiating with a man who has taken people hostage at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, during services on Saturday that were being livestreamed. Agents from the FBI were negotiating with a suspect believed to have taken four people hostage, including the synagogue’s rabbi, CNN reported. The Colleyville police said they were conducting Swat operations on the block where the Congregation Beth Israel synagogue is located and all residents in the immediate area were being evacuated. It was unclear whether there were any injuries and how the man might be armed. Police arrived at about 12.30pm local time. “We ask that you continue to avoid the area,” the Colleyville police department tweeted two hours after they arrived at the scene. The incident took place during an online livestream of the Shabbat service at the synagogue in Colleyville, in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area. The livestream cut off at about 2pm local time. Before the Facebook livestream was ended, a man could be heard ranting and talking about religion and his sister, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported. The man could be heard repeatedly saying he didn’t want to see anyone hurt and that he believed he was going to die, the newspaper said. Barry Klompus, 63, a member of the congregation since it opened in 1999, said he had been alerted to the situation by another member and quickly turned to the live feed until it was cut off. “It was horrible listening and watching, and it’s that much more horrible not knowing,” Klompus said in a Reuters telephone interview. Though he was not able to clearly understand what the man wanted, Klompus believes the man wanted to talk to his sister. A US official briefed on the matter told ABC News the hostage-taker claimed to be the brother of Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist serving an 86-year US prison sentence after her 2010 conviction of shooting at soldiers and FBI agents, and demanding she be freed. But authorities have not yet confirmed his identity, the official told ABC News. Siddiqui is being held at a federal prison in the Fort Worth area. “Colleyville Police Sgt Dara Nelson said negotiators have made contact with somebody inside the synagogue who they believe is a suspect,” the Dallas Morning News said. The American Jewish Committee said it was “deeply concerned” about the hostage situation at the synagogue. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the local Jewish community at this time,” the organization tweeted. “We will continue to monitor the situation as it develops.” Congregation Beth Israel began in 1998 as a chavurah, or a small group of Jewish people who gather for prayer services, its website states. This group established a synagogue in Colleyville in 1999 and moved to its current location in 2005. Colleyville is a city of about 23,000 people, located a short distance from the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. Law enforcement shut down access to the roads surrounding the synagogue on Saturday afternoon.