US President Donald Trump is reportedly considering calling off plans to livestream the firing-squad execution of Nidal Hasan after learning the Fort Hood shooter is paralysed and uses a wheelchair.

Hasan, who killed 13 people and injured 32 when he opened fire at the military base in 2009, is scheduled to be put to death on December 3.

US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth’s announcement last week that the execution would be public and the Pentagon’s subsequent confirmation of the plans to livestream it have provoked condemnation across the world – including in Australia.

Trump approved the execution by firing squad, but according to CNN he only learned during recent conversations with his advisers that Hasan had been paralysed from the waist down after being shot by police during the Fort Hood attack.

The network quoted sources as saying the fact that the killer now used a wheelchair make a public execution “less palatable” to the President, who has a “deep understanding of imagery”.

There is also said to be concern that terrorists could use the public execution to turn Hasan into a martyr.

During Hasan’s trial, it was revealed that the former US Army psychiatrist had spent weeks planning the deadly 2009 attack at Fort Hood, where he walked into a medical building and shouted “Allahu akbar” – Arabic for “God is great!” – as he opened fire on soldiers with a laser-sighted handgun.

He later described himself as a soldier who had “switched sides”.

Hegseth has said he wants Hasan’s execution made public “because people need to understand that there’s serious consequences for these types of things”.

On the weekend, Trump described the killer as “vicious” and “violent”.

“There are two thoughts: Don’t show it and show it. Because, you know, by showing it, maybe other people won’t be doing what he did.

“So, I’ll make a decision ultimately. I know what the military would like to do…”

Hasan’s execution would be the first carried out by a US Army firing squad since World War II. The plan to make it public has been labelled “barbaric” by many human rights advocates, politicians, religious leaders and others.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has said he finds the idea of livestreaming the death of anyone “completely abhorrent”, while One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce described it as “Roman amphitheatre stuff”.

If it does go ahead, however, the government has admitted it would be powerless to block the livestream from being viewed in Australia.