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While the nation settles into for a traditional Christmas holiday during slow-moving days of beach and blistering heat accompanied by the soundtrack of sporting matches and cicada song, this year the nation's summer atmosphere feels, unfortunately, like no other.

It would be a dramatic understatement to characterize the national disposition after the anti-Jewish violent assault on Jewish Australians during Bondi Hanukah festivities as one of mere discontent.

Across the country, but especially than in Sydney – the most postcard picturesque of the nation's urban centers – a tenor of initial surprise, grief and horror is segueing to anger and bitter division.

Those who had previously missed the frequently expressed concerns of Australian Jews are now acutely aware. Similarly, they are attuned to reconciling the need for a far more urgent, energetic official crackdown against anti-Jewish hatred with the freedom to demonstrate against genocide.

If ever there was a time for a national listening, it is now, when our belief in humanity is so deeply depleted. This is particularly so for those of us fortunate enough never to have experienced the hatred and fear of religious and ethnic targeting on this land or elsewhere.

And yet the algorithms keep churning out at us the banal instant opinions of those with blistering, polarizing stances but little understanding at all of that terrifying fragility.

This is a time when I lament not having a stronger spiritual belief. I mourn, because believing in people – in our potential for kindness – has failed us so painfully. A different source, something higher, is required.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have seen such profound instances of human goodness. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The bravery of those present. First responders – law enforcement and medical staff, those who charged into the danger to help fellow humans, some recognised but for the most part unnamed and unheralded.

When the police tape still waved in the wind all about Bondi, the necessity of community, faith-based and cultural solidarity was laudably promoted by religious figures. It was a call of compassion and tolerance – of unifying rather than splitting apart in a moment of antisemitic slaughter.

In keeping with the symbolism of the Festival of Lights (light amid darkness), there was so much appropriate reference of the need for hope.

Unity, hope and love was the essence of faith.

‘Our public places may not look quite the same again.’

And yet elements of the political landscape responded so nauseatingly swiftly with division, blame and accusation.

Some politicians gravitated straight for the darkness, using the atrocity as a cynical opportunity to question Australia’s migration rules.

Observe the harmful message of disunity from longstanding agitators of Australian racial division, capitalizing on the massacre before the crime scene was even cold. Then consider the statements of leadership aspirants while the probe was ongoing.

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

Like why, when the official terror alert was assessed as likely, did such a large open-air Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a woefully inadequate security presence? Like how could the alleged killers have six guns in the residence when the domestic intelligence organisation has so publicly and consistently alerted of the danger of targeted attacks?

How quickly we were treated to that tired line (or iterations of it) that it’s individuals not guns that kill. Of course, each point are valid. It’s possible to simultaneously pursue new ways to stop violent bigotry and prevent guns away from its possible perpetrators.

In this city of immense beauty, of pristine blue heavens above ocean and shore, the ocean and the coastline – our communal areas – may not look entirely familiar again to the many who’ve noted that famous Bondi seems so jarringly out of place with last weekend’s obscene violence.

We long right now for comprehension and meaning, for loved ones, and perhaps for the solace of beauty in culture or nature.

This weekend many Australians are calling off holiday gathering plans. Quiet contemplation will feel more in order.

But this is perhaps counterintuitively counterintuitive. For in these times of anxiety, outrage, sadness, confusion and grief we need 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 indicators are that unity in politics and society will be elusive this extended, draining summer.