Crusader forces took Gaza during the time of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. Muslim rulers later took it back. The city remained useful to armies because it stood on the road between Egypt and the Levant. Britannica’s chapter on the Crusades in Palestine places Gaza within the wider fight over the Holy Land.
After the Crusader period, Ayyubid and then Mamluk rulers governed Gaza. Their states were closely tied to Egypt and Syria. Gaza remained inhabited, useful for trade, and often contested. It was not a sovereign state.
The Ottoman Empire ruled the region from 1516 until 1917. Local officials and courts handled much of daily life within the imperial system. Britannica’s chapter on Ottoman rule in Palestine explains those arrangements. British officials later kept and revised parts of the system under the Mandate for Palestine.
People in Ottoman Palestine could belong to a town, family, faith, region, and empire at the same time. Palestine was a real name for a region. It was not a sovereign nation-state. Modern Israeli and Palestinian national identities grew from this world over time.