The Yehudah Project-US Support Israel as a Nation State

1. International support for its actions.
While it could certainly go it alone and thumb its nose at the opinion of the international community (and indeed, has done so on more than one occasion), the US, like any other country, wants to present its actions as having broad international support.

On this front, what it gets from Israel is unparalleled. Israel consistently votes with the US at the UN, and even highly controversial US actions (e.g: the invasion of Grenada or the 1986 bombing of Libya) won Israeli support at the UN and other  forums, while much closer US allies such as Great Britain opposed them, and in some cases took active steps to hinder US operations (i.e. France and Spain both denied US planes fly-over rights)

2. Military support
The US expects its allies to work together with its armed forces for joint defense and coordinated military action.

Again , Israel's record here is very good - from the transfer of captured Soviet technology to the US during the Cold War (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mun... or http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary....), through joint development of military technology (UAVs, Arrow antimissile system etc...) to being a poster-child for the superiority of American military technology over Soviet equivalents. Contrary to the ill-informed answers provided here , the US most certainly can and does use Israel as a base for military operations in SW Asia - it currently stores close to a billion dollars' worth of military gear in Israel, for use in military operations in the area.