Please fasten your seatbelts…

Flanked by Netanyahu and Peres, Obama is heading up the red carpet toward the plane. Everyone’s clothes are flapping in the wind.

There is some last-minute jocular hand-shaking and shoulder-clasping with a row of officials, including Netanyahu’s security adviser Yaakov Amidror. Speaking to Amidror, Obama repeats the Ben-Gurion quote he referenced during his speech yesterday — that in Israel realism requires believing in miracles. (Ben-Gurion, it is worth pointing out, was an ultra-realist who believed in people, not miracles.)

He embraces Ambassador Dan Shapiro, his wife and children. To one child whose front teeth have fallen out, Obama says, “Do you have to eat with a straw?”

Speaking to Netanyahu, he says, “The embassy staff love this country.”