The images from Gaza after October 7, 2023 circled the globe within hours. But the conditions that produced them had been building for decades—through partition, displacement, blockade, and successive cycles of war that international institutions repeatedly failed to resolve. Understanding what is happening in Gaza requires more than breaking news; it requires history. This book traces the Gaza conflict from its deep roots in the 1948 Nakba and the 1967 occupation through the Hamas electoral victory of 2006, the tightening blockade, and the catastrophic escalation of 2023–2024. Drawing on UN reports, Human Rights Watch documentation, Israeli and Palestinian primary sources, and on-the-ground journalism, it examines the political decisions, legal frameworks, and geopolitical interests that have shaped Gaza's trajectory. The analysis is unflinching but grounded—attentive to civilian testimony, international humanitarian law, and the competing political narratives that have made resolution so persistently elusive. This is not a book of sides. It is a book of record.