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As the nation winds down for a traditional Christmas holiday during languorous days of coast and scorching heat set to the background of Test cricket and insect sounds, this year the nation's summer mood feels, unfortunately, like no other.

It would be a dramatic oversimplification to describe the collective disposition after the antisemitic terrorist attack on Australian Jews during the beachside Hanukah celebrations as one of mere ennui.

Throughout the country, but especially than in Sydney – the most iconically beautiful of the nation's urban centers – a tone of initial surprise, sorrow and terror is segueing to fury and bitter polarization.

Those who had previously missed the often voiced concerns of Australian Jews are now acutely aware. Similarly, they are attuned to balancing the need for a far more urgent, vigorous government and institutional crackdown against antisemitism with the right to demonstrate against genocide.

If ever there was a moment for a national listening, it is now, when our belief in mankind is so sorely depleted. This is particularly so for those of us fortunate enough never to have experienced the animosity and dread of religious and ethnic targeting on this continent or elsewhere.

And yet the social media feeds keep spewing at us the trite instant opinions of those with blistering, polarizing stances but little understanding at all of that profound fragility.

This is a period when I regret not having a greater spiritual belief. I mourn, because having faith in people – in our capacity for compassion – has let us down so painfully. Something else, a greater power, is needed.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have witnessed such extreme examples of human decency. The heroism of individuals. The selflessness of bystanders. Emergency personnel – law enforcement and paramedics, those who charged into the danger to help others, some recognised but for the most part unnamed and unheralded.

When the barrier cordon still waved in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of community, religious and cultural unity was admirably promoted by religious figures. It was a call of love and acceptance – 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 fitting reference of the need for hope.

Unity, hope and love was the message of belief.

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

And yet segments of the political landscape reacted so nauseatingly quickly with division, finger-pointing and recrimination.

Some elected officials gravitated straight for the darkness, using tragedy as a calculating chance to question Australia’s immigration policies.

Witness the dangerous rhetoric of disunity from longstanding agitators of societal discord, exploiting the massacre before the crime scene was even cold. Then consider the statements of political figures while the probe was ongoing.

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

Like why, when the national terrorism threat level was assessed as likely, did such a large public Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a woefully inadequate security presence? Like how could the alleged killers have six guns in the family home when the security agency has so publicly and repeatedly alerted of the danger of targeted attacks?

How quickly we were subjected to that cliched argument (or versions of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that kill. Naturally, both things are valid. It’s feasible to at the same time pursue new ways to stop violent bigotry and prevent guns away from its potential actors.

In this city of immense beauty, of pristine blue heavens above sea and sand, the ocean and the beaches – our shared community spaces – may not look quite the same again to the many who’ve observed that famous Bondi seems so jarringly out of place with last weekend’s obscene bloodshed.

We yearn right now for comprehension and significance, for loved ones, and perhaps for the consolation of aesthetics in culture or nature.

This weekend many Australians are calling off Christmas party plans. Reflective solitude will feel more appropriate.

But this is perhaps somewhat counterintuitive. For in these days of anxiety, outrage, melancholy, bewilderment and grief we need each other more than ever.

The reassurance of togetherness – the human glue 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 the community will be hard to find this extended, enervating summer.