In the 50's and 60's, Israel had a much more precious ally than the US: France.
France enabled Israel to acquire nuclear technology (much to the US chagrin); France sold numerous Mirage IIIC's to Israel and the relationship was very strong until after the 6 days war in 1967. Israel occupied territories that it so far hasn't accepted to surrender.
Until the jewish extremist killed prime minister Rabin, I also had lots of sympathy for Israel; I even went there for 6 weeks in 1979 (after a question Jake Samorodin asked a few weeks ago, it looks like I'm the only one here who's ever been there).

You see, the safe zone or buffer zone the Israeli "need" to justify their stay in the occupied territories is a quite weak argument: Belgium was created in 1831 (the Vienna Treaty in 1815 creating then 17 United Provinces that split into Holland and Belgium, 15 years later). Belgium was meant to become the battlefield of Europe for the Germans, the French and the English to be able to wage war between each other without having to do it in their own country. It worked for a number of years, but now, there are missiles that easily cross the country. A buffer zone becomes a lot harder to defend.

Raoul