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As the nation settles into for a traditional Christmas holiday across languorous days of beach and blistering heat accompanied by the soundtrack of Test cricket and cicada song, this year the nation's summer mood seems, unfortunately, like no other.

It would be a dramatic oversimplification to describe the collective temperament after the anti-Jewish terrorist attack on Jewish Australians during Bondi Hanukah celebrations as one of mere ennui.

Throughout the country, but especially than in Sydney – the most iconically beautiful of Australian cities – a tone of initial surprise, grief and terror is shifting to anger and deep polarization.

Those who had not picked up on the frequently expressed concerns of Australian Jews are now acutely aware. Just as, they are sensitive to balancing the need for a far more urgent, vigorous government and institutional crackdown against antisemitism with the freedom to peacefully protest against mass atrocities.

If ever there was a moment for a countrywide dialogue, it is now, when our belief in humanity is so sorely diminished. This is especially so for those of us lucky never to have experienced the animosity and fear of faith-based targeting on this continent or elsewhere.

And yet the algorithms keep spewing at us the banal hot takes of those with inflammatory, polarizing views but no sense at all of that profound vulnerability.

This is a period when I regret not having a stronger spiritual belief. I lament, because believing in people – in mankind’s potential for kindness – has failed us so acutely. Something else, something higher, is required.

And yet from the atrocity of Bondi we have witnessed such profound instances of human decency. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The bravery of those present. First responders – law enforcement and paramedics, those who charged into the gunfire to help others, some recognised but for the most part anonymous and unsung.

When the barrier cordon still waved in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of community, faith-based and ethnic solidarity was laudably championed by faith leaders. It was a message of love and acceptance – of unifying rather than splitting apart in a moment of targeted violence.

Consistent with the symbolism of Hanukah (illumination amid gloom), there was so much appropriate reference of the need for hope.

Unity, hope and love was the message of faith.

‘Our shared community spaces may not look exactly as they did again.’

And yet segments of the Australian polity reacted so nauseatingly swiftly with division, finger-pointing and recrimination.

Some politicians gravitated straight for the pessimism, using the atrocity as a cynical chance to question Australia’s immigration policies.

Observe the dangerous rhetoric of disunity from veteran fomenters of societal discord, capitalizing on the massacre before the crime scene was even cold. Then read the statements of political figures while the investigation was still active.

Politics has a formidable job to do when it comes to uniting a nation that is grieving and scared and looking for the light and, not least, answers to so many uncertainties.

Like why, when the official terror alert was assessed as probable, did such a large public Hanukah event go ahead with such a grossly inadequate protection? Like how could the accused attackers have six guns in the family home when the security agency has so openly and repeatedly alerted of the danger of antisemitic violence?

How rapidly we were subjected to that cliched argument (or iterations of it) that it’s people not guns that kill. Of course, both things are valid. It’s possible to at the same time seek new ways to stop violent bigotry and prevent firearms away from its possible actors.

In this city of immense beauty, of pristine blue heavens above ocean and sand, the ocean and the coastline – our shared community spaces – may not look quite the same again to the many who’ve noted that iconic Bondi seems so incongruous with last weekend’s horrific violence.

We yearn right now for understanding and meaning, for family, and perhaps for the consolation of aesthetics in art or nature.

This weekend many Australians are cancelling Christmas party plans. Reflective solitude will feel more appropriate.

But this is perhaps somewhat against instinct. For in these days of fear, anger, sadness, confusion and loss we require each other now more than ever.

The reassurance of togetherness – the human glue of the unity in the very word – is what we probably need most.

But sadly, all of the portents are that cohesion in politics and the community will be elusive this long, draining summer.