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As Australia settles into for a customary Christmas holiday across slow-moving days of beach and scorching heat set to the soundtrack of Test cricket and cicada song, this year the country’s summer atmosphere feels, unfortunately, like none before.

It would be a significant oversimplification to characterize the collective temperament after the anti-Jewish violent assault on Australian Jews during the beachside Hanukah celebrations as one of mere ennui.

Across the country, but especially than in Sydney – the most iconically beautiful of Australian cities – a tone of immediate shock, sorrow and terror is segueing to fury and bitter polarization.

Those who had previously missed the frequently expressed concerns of Australian Jews are now acutely aware. Just as, they are attuned to reconciling the need for a much more immediate, vigorous official crackdown against anti-Jewish hatred with the right to demonstrate against genocide.

If ever there was a time for a countrywide dialogue, it is now, when our faith in humanity is so sorely depleted. This is particularly so for those of us lucky never to have experienced the hatred and fear of faith-based persecution on this land or anywhere else.

And yet the social media feeds keep churning out at us the trite hot takes of those with inflammatory, divisive stances but little understanding at all of that profound vulnerability.

This is a period when I lament not having a stronger spiritual belief. I mourn, because believing in humanity – in mankind’s capacity for kindness – has let us down so acutely. Something else, something higher, is required.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have witnessed such extreme examples of human decency. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The bravery of those present. Emergency personnel – police officers and paramedics, those who ran towards the danger to help fellow humans, some recognised but for the most part anonymous and unsung.

When the police tape still waved in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of social, faith-based and ethnic unity was admirably championed by faith leaders. It was a message of compassion and tolerance – of bringing together rather than dividing in a time of antisemitic slaughter.

Consistent with the symbolism of Hanukah (light amid gloom), there was so much fitting evocation of the need for lightness.

Unity, hope and love was the essence of faith.

‘Our shared community spaces may not appear quite the same again.’

And yet elements of the Australian polity reacted so disgustingly quickly with fragmentation, blame and recrimination.

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

Observe the harmful message of disunity from veteran agitators of Australian racial division, exploiting the attack before the site was even cold. Then read the statements of political figures while the probe was ongoing.

Politics has a formidable job to do when it comes to bringing together a nation that is mourning and frightened and seeking the hope and, importantly, answers to so many questions.

Like why, when the national terrorism threat level was judged as probable, did such a significant public Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a woefully insufficient protection? Like how could the alleged killers have multiple firearms in the residence when the domestic intelligence organisation has so openly and repeatedly alerted of the danger of targeted attacks?

How quickly we were treated to that cliched argument (or iterations of it) that it’s people not guns that kill. Naturally, each point are true. It’s feasible to simultaneously seek new ways to prevent violent bigotry and keep firearms away from its possible actors.

In this metropolis of immense beauty, of pristine blue heavens above sea and sand, the ocean and the beaches – our communal areas – may not look quite the same again to the many who’ve observed that iconic Bondi seems so incongruous with last weekend’s horrific violence.

We yearn right now for understanding and meaning, for loved ones, and perhaps for the solace of aesthetics in culture or nature.

This weekend many Australians are cancelling Christmas party plans. Quiet contemplation will feel more appropriate.

But this is perhaps counterintuitively against instinct. For in these times of fear, anger, sadness, bewilderment and loss we need each other now more than ever.

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

But sadly, all of the portents are that unity in politics and the community will be hard to find this extended, draining summer.