In 1990, a young American woman trades her familiar life for a place she can barely find on a map: the Gaza Strip. Newly married to a Palestinian physician, Hilary steps into a coastal enclave gripped by the Intifada and the looming shadow of the First Gulf War. What follows is an education in community, resilience, and profound love. Everyone she encounters in this lovable, beleaguered place—from the most obscure to the renowned and the famous—has a story to tell or a lesson to teach. She experiences a Gaza far removed from the evening news, a vibrant society of ordinary people living extraordinary lives under intense pressure.

When tensions linked to a faltering peace process ultimately induce her family to relocate to the United States, that world stays with her. Decades later, a new war in Gaza brings all the emotions and some of the people back to her. Gaza: A Love Story offers a deeply human, clear-eyed window into a place the world thinks it knows.