Gilad Shalit's family have announced that they will allow the Prime Minister's Office to publish the videotape of their son, who is held captive in Gaza.

The video, filmed on September 14, apparently shows Shalit looking healthy and talking coherently in a manner which sounds less scripted than previous audio releases.

The video is also over two minutes long, not one minute as was previously reported.

Shalit is clean-shaven and holding a newspaper with the correct date on it, sitting in a whitewashed room.

Israeli press reports say that Shalit is talking about an incident from his past in the short film.

Israel agreed to release 20 Palestinian woman prisoners in exchange for the video, the first released of Shalit since his capture in 2006.

International aid organisations are denied access to the solider and no news had been heard from him since a letter in 2008 and an audio message in 2007.

Egyptian and German mediators negotiated the decision to release the women in exchange for the video.