Though the anti-Israel chants on college campuses may be loud, they aren’t especially influential: Few voters, including young ones, put the war in Gaza anywhere near the top of their list of political priorities. But a clear majority of Americans back the current level of support for Israel or even want to increase it, according to a recent ABC News/Ipsos poll. The cutoff will further alienate pro-Israel voters and will only partly mollify anti-Israel ones, who will now pressure the president to go much further.

In other words, it’s a classic case of falling between stools. It also plays into the perception that Biden is weak — unable to stand up to the left flank of his party, and a feckless ally to our embattled friends. The last time the United States bailed on an ally, in Afghanistan, the result was a political debacle from which the president’s approval rating never recovered. Why would the White House want to put voters in mind of that episode?