The Israelis control every single exit point of Gaza, as well as the power lines and access to water, and boy they use that as leverage more often than not, even in time of "peace". The inhabitants can't leave Gaza unless approved by Israel and/or Egypt, a quite rare occurence. There's a maritime blockade and the Gazaouis can't go further than 11km of the coastline which is a problem when it comes to fishing. The airport has been bombed by the IAF which controls their airspace in its entirety. There are severe restictions on importation of goods as well as exportations, which basically ruined Gaza's economy leading to an explosion of unemployement (about 52%). According to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, 68% of the households are food insecure. Homes in the Gaza Strip suffer, on an average, 17 hours of power cuts daily according to the same organization. My ex-wife who was there and told about the daily humiliations and chicanes at the checkpoints. People there have no hope, there's no future they can look forward to.
But yeah, lets play semantics and say that it's not exactly an open-air prison.
I have no doubts that China had no qualms suppressing the Tibetans but I'm not really sure of what you're getting at. Should the Palestinians self-immolate to make their voice heard, or are you implying that their culture and religion makes them more prone to acts violence towards others? Because as far as I know, human history proved that when occupying forces go too hard on the population, they do tend to revolt and it's generally bloody. Also if the occupying forces dispose of an overwhelming military advantage, the occupied will then concentrate on "softer" targets. The objective here isn't to obtain decisive military victory, this generally can't be achieved, but to make the cost of occupation so high that it becomes not worth it at some point. I can give you two recent examples I'm familiar with, The Indochina and Algeria Wars of Independance in the 50's and 60's. You can add the Black Resistance against the Apartheid regime in South Africa, in a different context though.
Apologies in advance if I misunderstood you.