Java Statements, processing precedence ("dangling else")

Of course, the answer is in the Java Language Specification. The relevant section is section 14.5, "Statements", which describes exactly this case:

As in C and C++, the if statement of the Java programming language suffers from the so-called "dangling else problem," illustrated by this misleadingly formatted example:

if (door.isOpen())
    if (resident.isVisible())
        resident.greet("Hello!");
else door.bell.ring();  // A "dangling else"

The problem is that both the outer if statement and the inner if statement might conceivably own the else clause. In this example, one might surmise that the programmer intended the else clause to belong to the outer if statement.

And finally:

The Java programming language, like C and C++ and many programming languages before them, arbitrarily decrees that an else clause belongs to the innermost if to which it might possibly belong.

_{(emphasis by me)}