PHARAOH’S GREEN NEW DEAL: With Passover coming up next month, it’s time to reflect on whether Pharaoh gets a bad rap. After all, no fossil fuels were used in building the pyramids with Hebrew labor. Indeed, when Pharoah withheld straw from the Hebrew slaves (according to rabbinic commentaries), he was preserving natural resources! And he surely took measures, though perhaps a bit extreme, to limit the Hebrews’ population growth.