Tuesday’s report details firsthand accounts of several Gazans who say they are doing everything they can to protect themselves and their families from becoming human shields for Hamas militants.

Nasser al-Zaanin, for example, was forced to flee his home in northern Gaza in October, and relocated to a school that had been turned into a shelter in the town of Deir al-Balah, along with his adult sons and grandchildren. When al-Zaanin arrived at the shelter, he helped set up a system of committees to improve life for families who had taken refuge by overseeing the distribution of food, water and medical needs. They also established one hard and fast rule: no armed men allowed in the compound.

“All the families agreed,” said al-Zaanin, who once worked as a civil servant for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza. “We simply want to save all families, women and children and not let there be any potential threat against us because of the existence of police and members of the Hamas government.”