[2][3][4][5] In the book, Khalidi—historian and Edward Said Professor of Modern Arab Studies at Columbia University—argues that the struggle in Palestine should be understood, not as one between two equal national movements fighting over the same land, but rather as "a colonial war waged against the indigenous population, by a variety of parties, to force them to relinquish their homeland to another people against their will.

[4] The third chapter highlights the colonial role of the US in the Lyndon B. Johnson administration's approbation of Israel's preemptive strikes on Egypt, Jordan, and Syria in the 1967 War, as well as in its support for UNSC Resolution 242, which legitimated the conquest of East Jerusalem, West Bank, Gaza Strip, Sinai Peninsula, and Golan Heights and made no mention of Palestine or the Palestinians or their rights.

[9] The fifth chapter addresses the Israeli backlash against the First Intifada, the expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, and the Oslo Accords—which did not resolve any fundamental Palestinian demands, such as national sovereignty, an end to occupation and colonization, the right of return for refugees, an agreement on Jerusalem, delineated borders, and land and water rights, and which were arranged based on close political, diplomatic, and military ties between Israel and the US, and were therefore tantamount to "another internationally sanctioned American-Israeli declaration of war on the Palestinians in furtherance of the Zionist movement's century-old project.

[4] The author notes that the massive death toll and physical destruction of buildings and infrastructure were caused by lethal weapons supplied to Israel by the US, including armed drones, Apache helicopters, F-15 and F-16 war planes, and 155mm howitzer artillery guns.

"[10] The book was translated into Arabic by Amir Shaykhūnī [ar] under the title "Ḥarb al-miʼah ʻām ʻalaʹ Filisṭīn : qiṣat al-istiʻmār al-istīṭānī wa-al muqawimah 1917–2017" (حرب المئة عام على فلسطين: قصة الاستعمار الاستيطاني والمقاومة 1917–2017).