The subjects in Tanya Habjouqa’s photos laugh and play on Gaza beaches. They have fun. They smile. They also live with the realities of a closed border and a government run by Hamas.

"One cannot just live on misery and drama," Habjouqa says. "You need comedy, happiness."

Habjouqa—who was born in Jordan, raised in Texas, and is married to a Palestinian with an Israeli passport—has been working in the area for years. She’s done her share of hard-news photography, but since 2009, she’s also been taking photos for her "Occupied Pleasures" series. A book of them will be published in December. Habjouqa says she doesn't want to trivialize her subjects’ difficulties by showing them in carefree moods, but those moods are