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As the nation settles into for a customary Christmas holiday across languorous days of beach and scorching heat accompanied by the soundtrack of Test cricket and insect sounds, this year the nation's summer mood seems, unfortunately, like none before.

It would be a significant oversimplification to describe the collective temperament after the anti-Jewish violent assault on Australian Jews during Bondi Hanukah celebrations as one of mere discontent.

Throughout the country, but nowhere more so than in Sydney – the most postcard picturesque of the nation's urban centers – a tenor of immediate surprise, grief and horror is shifting to anger and bitter division.

Those who had previously missed the frequently expressed concerns of Australian Jews are now acutely aware. Similarly, they are sensitive to balancing the need for a much more immediate, vigorous government and institutional fight against anti-Jewish hatred with the freedom to demonstrate against genocide.

If ever there was a moment for a countrywide dialogue, it is now, when our belief in mankind is so deeply diminished. This is especially so for those of us lucky never to have experienced the animosity and fear of religious and ethnic persecution on this land or anywhere else.

And yet the algorithms keep spewing at us the trite hot takes of those with blistering, polarizing views but little understanding at all of that profound fragility.

This is a period when I lament not having a greater spiritual belief. I lament, because believing in humanity – in our capacity for compassion – has failed us so acutely. Something else, something higher, is needed.

And yet from the atrocity of Bondi we have seen such extreme examples of human goodness. The heroism of individuals. The bravery of those present. Emergency personnel – law enforcement and medical staff, those who charged into the danger to help fellow humans, some recognised 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 ethnic unity was laudably championed by faith leaders. It was a message of love and acceptance – of unifying rather than splitting apart in a moment of antisemitic slaughter.

Consistent with the symbolism of the Festival of Lights (illumination amid gloom), there was so much appropriate evocation of the need for lightness.

Togetherness, light and compassion was the message of faith.

‘Our public places may not appear exactly as they did again.’

And yet segments of the Australian polity responded so nauseatingly quickly with division, blame and accusation.

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

Observe the dangerous message of division from longstanding agitators of Australian racial division, exploiting the massacre before the crime scene was even cold. Then read the statements of political figures while the probe was ongoing.

Government has a daunting job to do when it comes to bringing together a nation that is grieving and scared and looking for the light and, importantly, explanations to so many uncertainties.

Like why, when the national terrorism threat level was assessed as probable, did such a significant public Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a woefully insufficient protection? Like how could the accused attackers have six guns in the residence when the security agency has so openly and repeatedly alerted of the danger of targeted attacks?

How rapidly we were subjected to that cliched line (or iterations of it) that it’s people not weapons that kill. Naturally, each point are true. It’s possible to simultaneously seek new ways to stop hate-fuelled violence and prevent firearms away from its potential actors.

In this city of immense splendor, of pristine blue heavens above sea and sand, the water and the coastline – our communal areas – may not seem quite the same again to the many who’ve observed that famous Bondi seems so incongruous with last weekend’s obscene bloodshed.

We yearn right now for understanding and meaning, for loved ones, and perhaps for the solace of beauty in art or nature.

This weekend many Australians are cancelling holiday gathering plans. Reflective solitude will seem more in order.

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

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

But sadly, all of the portents are that unity in public life and the community will be hard to find this long, draining summer.