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As the nation winds down for a customary Christmas holiday during slow-moving days of beach and scorching heat accompanied by the background of sporting matches and insect sounds, this year the nation's summer mood feels, unfortunately, like no other.

It would be a significant oversimplification to describe the collective temperament after the antisemitic terrorist attack on Australian Jews during Bondi Hanukah celebrations as one of simple discontent.

Throughout the country, but nowhere more so than in Sydney – the most postcard picturesque of Australian cities – a tenor of immediate shock, sorrow and horror is segueing to anger and deep polarization.

Those who had not picked up on the frequently expressed fears of the Jewish community are now highly attuned. Just as, they are attuned to balancing the need for a much more immediate, energetic government and institutional fight against anti-Jewish hatred with the right 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 animosity and fear of religious and ethnic persecution on this land or elsewhere.

And yet the algorithms keep churning out at us the trite instant opinions of those with blistering, polarizing stances but no sense at all of that terrifying fragility.

This is a time when I lament not having a stronger spiritual belief. I lament, because believing in humanity – in our potential for compassion – has let us down so painfully. Something else, a greater power, is needed.

And yet from the atrocity of Bondi we have witnessed such profound examples of human decency. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The selflessness of bystanders. First responders – law enforcement and medical staff, those who ran towards the danger to aid others, some publicly hailed but for the most part unnamed and unheralded.

When the police tape still fluttered in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of social, religious and ethnic solidarity was admirably promoted by religious figures. It was a call of love and tolerance – of unifying rather than dividing in a moment of targeted violence.

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

Unity, light and compassion was the message of faith.

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

And yet elements of the political landscape responded so disgustingly quickly with fragmentation, finger-pointing and accusation.

Some politicians moved straight for the darkness, using the atrocity as a cynical chance to challenge Australia’s immigration policies.

Observe the dangerous rhetoric of division from longstanding agitators of societal discord, capitalizing on the massacre before the crime scene was even cold. Then consider the statements of leadership aspirants while the probe was ongoing.

Government has a formidable task to do when it comes to bringing together a nation that is grieving and scared and seeking the light and, not least, answers to so many questions.

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 security presence? Like how could the alleged killers have six guns in the residence when the domestic intelligence organisation has so openly and repeatedly alerted of the danger of antisemitic violence?

How quickly we were subjected to that tired argument (or versions of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that cause death. Naturally, each point are true. It’s feasible to simultaneously seek new ways to stop violent bigotry and prevent firearms away from its possible actors.

In this city of immense beauty, of clear azure skies above sea and sand, the ocean and the beaches – our communal areas – may not seem quite the same again to the multitude who’ve observed that iconic Bondi seems so jarringly out of place with last weekend’s obscene bloodshed.

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

This weekend many Australians are calling off holiday gathering plans. Reflective solitude will seem more appropriate.

But this is perhaps counterintuitively counterintuitive. For in these days of fear, outrage, melancholy, confusion and grief we require each other more than ever.

The reassurance 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 elusive this extended, enervating summer.