Crisis in Israel Tests the Complicated Ties Between Biden and Netanyahu

But as Mr. Netanyahu pledged on Thursday to move forward with plans to give the government greater control over appointments to the Supreme Court, observers said that Mr. Biden’s attempts to nudge the prime minister toward an offramp may have been futile.

“He’s going for it; that’s the bottom line,” Mr. Makovsky said, referring to Mr. Netanyahu’s decision to push the judicial overhaul plan. “He’s going forward with the most contentious part.”

There have been other high-stakes cases, aides to Mr. Biden pointed out, when the rapport between the pair has helped calm tensions. In May of 2021, their dynamic was tested when tensions among Palestinian protesters, Israeli police and right-wing Israelis devolved into two weeks of intense fighting between Hamas militants and Israeli forces. The clash left over 200 people dead, many of them killed by Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip.

At one point, the president sharply told Mr. Netanyahu that he would only be able to fend off criticism of the Gaza strikes for so long. The two spoke a half dozen times during that period, according to a person familiar with their conversations. Even then, the president never publicly wavered: “There is no shift in my commitment, commitment, to the security of Israel, period,” Mr. Biden said, bucking pressure from within his own party to take a more skeptical stance toward an ally whose politics have shifted increasingly to the right, observers say, as a means of political survival.

Though Mr. Netanyahu has governed Israel for much of the past quarter-century, Mr. Biden — as he is quick to point out — has enjoyed close relationships with Israeli leaders dating back to Golda Meir, the country’s fourth prime minister.

“Every chance to return to this great country, where the ancient roots of the Jewish people date back to biblical times, is a blessing,” Mr. Biden said on a trip to Israel — his 10th visit — last July. “Because the connection between the Israeli people and the American people is bone deep. It’s bone deep. Generation after generation, that connection grows. We invest in each other. We dream together. We’re part of what has always been the objective we both had.”