Hamas is reviewing plans for a three-stage truce with Israel which foresee a weeks-long halt to the Gaza conflict, a source in the Palestinian group told AFP.

Only “women, children and sick men over 60” who are captive in Gaza will be freed at this stage, the Hamas source told AFP, declining to be named given the sensitivity of the issue.

Palestinian fighters seized about 250 hostages during Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel. Israel says 132 of the hostages remain in Gaza including at least 29 people believed to have been killed.