The U.S. and Israel have reached out to officials of three East African governments to discuss using their territories as potential destinations for resettling Palestinians uprooted from the Gaza Strip under President Donald Trump’s proposed postwar plan,

Israeli officials led by strategic affairs minister Ron Dermer have sounded out the governments of Somalia and Sudan, countries wracked by civil war, while US diplomats have been in contact with the breakaway province of Somaliland,

Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to free an American-Israeli dual national if Israel begins a phase of ceasefire talks towards a permanent end to the war, but Israel dismissed the offer as "psychological warfare".

The militant group did not immediately specify when the release of soldier Edan Alexander and the four bodies would take place.

The offer to release the American hostage appears to be an effort to pressure Israel into starting discussions over a second phase to the ceasefire in Gaza.