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When Joe Biden touched down in Tel Aviv on March 8, there was no indication that his visit would set off the most serious crisis in U.S.-Israeli relations in decades. The U.S. vice president arrived carrying the text of an effusively pro-Israel speech that was meant to assure skittish Israelis that the Obama administration would remain as committed as any of its predecessors to their security. Such an assurance, the administration evidently believed, was essential if the United States was to persuade the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to remove settlements from the West Bank in order to make way for a Palestinian state.

But Biden’s plans were soon upended. On March 9, a mid-level official in Israel’s Interior Ministry announced the...