Racist, homophobic, and discriminatory, that's the way Israel is portrayed in a new feature published by the Los Angeles Times on Sunday, following what the paper calls as a "wave of intolerance toward people of different races, religions, orientations and viewpoints" that is washing the country.

Open gallery view The protest against foreign workers and refugees in Tel Aviv's Hatikva neighborhood, Dec. 21, 2010. Credit: Ofer Vaknin

The L.A. Times piece comes in the wake of several social issues that have plagued Israel in recent weeks and months – including a rabbinical letter forbidding renting apartments to Arabs, an attack on a Tel Aviv gay and lesbian youth club, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman's controversial loyalty oath bill, as well as an on-going debate on Israel's official policy toward migrant workers.

Writing of what it called "a wave of intolerance," the piece describes Israelis as "grappling with their nation's identity and character," adding that to some "the timing of the rising intolerance is surprising.

"The number of terrorist attacks in Israel dropped last year to its lowest level in more than a decade, and Israel's economy is growing faster than those of most other countries," the L.A. times wrote.

One Israeli politician, the Labor Party's Daniel Ben Simon, saw a connection between the relative lull in regional violence and Israel's social woes, telling the L.A. Times that "the stronger the external tension, the more repressed the internal tension."

"Any lull in outside pressure causes the internal ones to rise. This led people to feel that if they're squared off with the outside and feel secure enough, 'Let's fight a bit,'" Ben-Simon was quoted as saying.

The U.S. newspaper also quotes Bambi Sheleg, founder of social affairs magazine A Different Country [Eretz Acheret], who said "extremist viewpoints are receiving more attention."

"Israeli society consists of a gigantic center," she told the L.A. Times, adding that, however, "there is no one to lead it and its voice isn't heard."

"We are on the threshold of the understanding that we all have to live here together and compromise," she said. "These are growing pains."