Water can resist a greater external force than ethanol due to its greater surface tension.
Reason:
Surface Tension in liquids is caused by the cohesive forces among the molecules of liquids at the surface. Means the liquids molecules at the surface have a net attractive interactions with molecules beneath them and cause them to contract causing tension.
Now comparing water and ethanol, water has stronger intermolecular interactions than ethanol because water has two Hydrogen bongd donors (i.e. Hydrogens directly attached to oxygen atom) while ethanol has only one Hydrogen Bond Donors. This strong intermolecular interactions in water makes greater surface tension.