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As the nation winds down for a traditional Christmas holiday across slow-moving days of beach and blistering heat set to the background of sporting matches and insect sounds, this year the nation's summer mood seems, unfortunately, like no other.

It would be a dramatic oversimplification to describe the collective disposition 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 tenor of initial shock, sorrow and horror is segueing to fury and deep division.

Those who had not picked up on the frequently expressed concerns of the Jewish community are now highly attuned. Just as, they are sensitive to balancing the need for a much more immediate, energetic government and institutional crackdown against antisemitism with the freedom to demonstrate against genocide.

If ever there was a moment for a national listening, it is now, when our belief in humanity is so sorely depleted. This is especially so for those of us fortunate enough never to have endured the hatred and dread of faith-based targeting on this land or anywhere else.

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

This is a time when I regret not having a greater faith. I mourn, because having faith in humanity – in mankind’s potential for kindness – has let us down so painfully. Something else, something higher, is required.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have seen such extreme examples of human decency. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The bravery of those present. Emergency personnel – law enforcement and paramedics, those who ran towards the gunfire to help fellow humans, some publicly hailed but for the most part anonymous and unheralded.

When the police tape still waved in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of community, faith-based and cultural unity was laudably promoted by religious figures. It was a message of love and acceptance – of bringing together rather than dividing in a moment of targeted violence.

In keeping with the meaning of Hanukah (illumination amid gloom), there was so much fitting evocation of the need for lightness.

Togetherness, hope and compassion was the essence of belief.

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

And yet elements of the political landscape responded so disgustingly swiftly with fragmentation, blame and recrimination.

Some elected officials gravitated straight for the darkness, using tragedy as a cynical opportunity to challenge Australia’s migration rules.

Observe the dangerous rhetoric of division from longstanding fomenters of societal discord, capitalizing on the attack before the site was even cold. Then consider the words of political figures while the investigation was ongoing.

Government has a daunting task to do when it comes to uniting a nation that is mourning and scared and looking for the hope and, importantly, explanations to so many uncertainties.

Like why, when the national terrorism threat level was judged as likely, did such a large public Hanukah event go ahead with such a grossly insufficient protection? Like how could the alleged killers have multiple firearms in the family home when the security agency has so publicly and repeatedly alerted of the threat of targeted attacks?

How rapidly we were subjected to that tired argument (or iterations of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that kill. Of course, each point are true. It’s feasible to at the same time pursue new ways to stop hate-fuelled violence and prevent firearms away from its potential perpetrators.

In this metropolis of immense splendor, of pristine azure skies above sea and sand, the water and the coastline – our shared community spaces – may not look entirely familiar again to the many who’ve noted that famous Bondi seems so incongruous with last weekend’s horrific violence.

We long right now for comprehension and meaning, for loved ones, and perhaps for the consolation of aesthetics in culture or the natural world.

This weekend many Australians are cancelling Christmas party plans. Reflective solitude will seem more in order.

But this is perhaps counterintuitively counterintuitive. For in these days of anxiety, anger, sadness, bewilderment and loss we require each other more than ever.

The comfort of togetherness – the binding force of the unity in the very word – is what we likely need most.

But tragically, all of the portents are that cohesion in politics and society will be hard to find this extended, enervating summer.