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As the nation settles into for a customary Christmas holiday across languorous days of coast and scorching heat accompanied by the soundtrack of sporting matches and insect sounds, this year the nation's summer atmosphere seems, sadly, like no other.

It would be a dramatic understatement to describe 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 the nation's urban centers – a tone of immediate shock, sorrow and terror is segueing to fury and deep division.

Those who had previously missed the often voiced fears of Australian Jews are now acutely aware. Just as, they are attuned to reconciling the need for a far more urgent, vigorous government and institutional crackdown against antisemitism with the right to peacefully protest against genocide.

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

And yet the social media feeds keep spewing at us the trite instant opinions of those with blistering, divisive views but no sense at all of that terrifying fragility.

This is a time when I lament not having a stronger faith. I mourn, because having faith in humanity – in mankind’s potential for compassion – has failed us so painfully. Something else, a greater power, is required.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have witnessed such extreme instances of human decency. The heroism of individuals. The bravery of those present. Emergency personnel – police officers and paramedics, those who charged into the gunfire to help others, some recognised but for the most part unnamed and unsung.

When the barrier cordon still waved in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of community, religious and ethnic solidarity was admirably promoted by religious figures. It was a call of compassion and acceptance – of unifying rather than dividing in a time of antisemitic slaughter.

In keeping with the symbolism of Hanukah (illumination amid darkness), there was so much appropriate reference of the need for lightness.

Unity, hope and compassion was the essence of belief.

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

And yet segments of the political landscape reacted so disgustingly swiftly with fragmentation, blame and accusation.

Some politicians moved straight for the darkness, using the atrocity as a calculating chance to question Australia’s migration rules.

Witness the dangerous rhetoric of division from longstanding agitators of societal discord, exploiting the massacre before the crime scene was even cold. Then consider the words of leadership aspirants while the probe was ongoing.

Politics has a formidable task to do when it comes to uniting a nation that is grieving and frightened and seeking the hope and, not least, explanations to so many uncertainties.

Like why, when the official terror alert was assessed as probable, did such a significant open-air Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a grossly insufficient security presence? Like how could the accused attackers have multiple firearms in the family home when the security agency has so publicly and consistently warned of the threat of antisemitic violence?

How rapidly we were treated to that cliched line (or versions of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that kill. Naturally, both things are true. It’s possible to at the same time pursue new ways to prevent hate-fuelled violence and prevent firearms away from its potential actors.

In this city of immense splendor, of clear azure skies above ocean and shore, the ocean and the coastline – our communal areas – may not seem entirely familiar again to the many who’ve noted that iconic Bondi seems so incongruous with last weekend’s obscene violence.

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

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

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

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

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