What explains diachronic variation in the strategies that stateless nationalist movements pursue in their interactions with dominant states? Why is such variation often absent, or delayed and I complete, when a change in national strategy would be advantageous or expected? This paper uses the Palestinian national movement as a lens through which to examine different types of strategies that self-determination movements pursue and the processes through which these strategies change. As the Oslo process and two-state solution have been dislodged as the presumed pathway and eventual outcome of the conflict with Israel, the current juncture in Palestinian politics presents an opportunity for studying the evolution of national strategy. The options available to Palestinians are often framed dichotomously as continued pursuit of an independent state or transition to a civil rights struggle within Greater Israel, or alternatively as violence or non-violence. Yet this framing lacks sufficient nuance to represent the range of debate within the national movement or the choices that actors on the ground actually face as they navigate the political options available to them. Despite the abundance of calls for revitalizing the Palestinian national project with new strategies, there has been little social scientific analysis of strategy formation that could inform evaluation of these different options or assessment of the emergent trends that make some more or less likely to be realized. This paper traces the discursive space of strategic debate within the national movement, typologizes the strategies under consideration at the current juncture, and develops a theory of strategy formation that highlights political agency at the intersection of top-down and bottom-up political processes.