Palestinian militant group says ready to release 2 hostages

Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) movement, announced in a statement on Thursday that it was prepared to release two hostages for humanitarian reasons.

The statement in Arabic identified the two hostages as "Hanna Katsir and the boy Yagil Yaqoub," without specifying their nationalities.

The initiative will be implemented if certain conditions are met to ensure the security of the Palestinian people, the statement added.

The group also released videos of the two hostages addressing the camera.

The PIJ previously announced that it was holding 30 hostages in the Gaza Strip after its armed men entered southern Israel during the Al-Aqsa Flood operation led by the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) on October 7.

Earlier in the day, an Israeli government source told Xinhua that Israel is "willing" to temporarily pause the fighting in the Gaza Strip if Hamas shows "a genuine commitment" to releasing the hostages.

The health ministry in Gaza said on Thursday that the Palestinian death toll from the Israeli strikes on the Palestinian enclave that have been going on for over a month rose to 10,818.

The Israeli military operations came in retaliation for the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, in which more than 1,400 people were killed in Israel and about 240 hostages were taken, according to Israeli figures.