Many others drew on tropes from science fiction and fantasy, invoking comic-book
villains, the Harry Potter novels and films, and even “The Wizard of Oz.”
Breitbart, the far-right news website that has been a champion of Mr. Trump’s campaign
and his presidency, took notice as well, juxtaposing an image of the leaders with a clip showing George Lucas, the “Star Wars” creator, saying, “I may have gone too far in a few places.”
Brian Klaas, a political scientist who has been critical of Mr. Trump, likened the
leaders to the evil wizard Saruman from J. R. R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings.”
The real meaning of the sphere had little to do with the occult.
President Trump, King Salman of Saudi Arabia and President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt entered a darkened
room filled with row after row of computers in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, on Sunday evening.
Bill Kristol, a prominent conservative critic of Mr. Trump, likened the group to the conclave of witches in “Macbeth.”
"Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and caldron bubble."
The occasion was the opening of a new Global Center for Combating Extremist Ideology, based in Riyadh,
and the orb was in fact a translucent globe, with the world’s waters represented in light gray and the continents in black.
