Benjamin Netanyahu has said Hamas is deliberately trying to keep civilians in Gazan hospitals, where the US and Israel say its terrorists are hiding.

Speaking to CNN, Israel’s prime minister said more than 100 patients had already been evacuated from Al-Shifa, Gaza’s largest hospital, and Israel had offered safe passage out.

But he said that Hamas was “doing everything in its power to keep them [patients] in harm’s way”.

On Sunday Jake Sullivan, US national security adviser, backed Israel’s claim that Hamas was using hospitals as “command and control” centres.

“Hamas is using hospitals as it uses many other civilian facilities, for command and control, for weapons storage, to house its fighters and this is a violation of the laws of war,” Mr Sullvan told CBS News.

Earlier, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) offered to help evacuate nearly 40 premature babies from al-Shifa after doctors claimed they could otherwise die.

The 37 infants are in a unit at the al-Shifa hospital, where the neonatal ward has been closed after Israel’s blockade of Gaza caused electricity and fuel shortages.

Doctors at al-Shifa say that three premature babies have already died there and claim there is a “real risk” of further fatalities if the infants cannot access proper intensive care facilities.

Israel says the hospital, which is close to being surrounded by the IDF, houses a Hamas command and control centre in tunnels beneath its precincts.

The IDF has already been involved in helping staff and patients at other hospitals to evacuate, co-ordinating safe passage via talks between hospital officials and IDF Arabic language speakers.

Major Libby Weiss, for the Israeli military, told the BBC it was responding to Hamas fire being launched adjacent to the hospital and not targeting  al-Shifa.

“We are in touch with the staff at al-Shifa hospital and will help evacuate, as we already did with the Nasser and Rantisi hospitals,” Maj Weiss said.

But the head of a British charity said on Sunday it was not that simple.

“With ambulances unable to reach the hospital – particularly those with the skills and equipment needed to transfer these babies – and no hospital with capacity to receive them, there is no indication of how this can be done safely,” said Melanie Ward, CEO of Medical Aid for Palestinians, which has supported the neonatal unit at al-Shifa for years.

Ms Ward said to ensure the babies’ safety Israel should allow fuel to reach the hospital.

Since Israeli troops and tanks encircled Gaza City, just one hospital, the Al-Ahli al-Arabi, has had enough fuel to remain operational, said Dr Fadel Naim. On Sunday the Palestine Red Crescent Society announced that the Al-Quds Hospital in Gaza City – the second largest in the territory – was now out of service.

“The situation is catastrophic,” said Dr Naim, head of orthopaedic surgery at the hospital.

“We have a very limited team and at the same time our colleagues at al-Shifa cannot come to help us. We receive hundreds of injured people every day, not only injuries but also people with chronic illness and pregnant women who need caesarean sections. We cannot help all of them.”

The hospital is now acting like a field hospital, Dr Naim said, but supplies are running dangerously low. Dr Naim said on Sunday it had run out of blood, leaving doctors unable to carry out transfusions in critical surgery.

Meanwhile, Israeli forces fired artillery into southern Lebanon after an incoming anti-tank missile wounded several Israeli civilians near the border, an army spokesman said.

Hezbollah,  the Iran-backed Shia movement, later claimed responsibility for the attack but said it had hit soldiers, not civilians.