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As Australia settles into for a customary Christmas holiday during languorous days of coast and blistering heat set to the soundtrack of sporting matches and cicada song, this year the country’s summer mood seems, unfortunately, like none before.

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

Across the country, but especially than in Sydney – the most postcard picturesque of Australian cities – a tenor of initial shock, grief and terror is shifting to anger and deep division.

Those who had not picked up on the often voiced concerns 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 fight against anti-Jewish hatred with the right to peacefully protest against genocide.

If ever there was a time for a national listening, it is now, when our belief in mankind is so deeply depleted. This is particularly so for those of us fortunate enough never to have endured the animosity and dread of religious and ethnic targeting on this land or anywhere else.

And yet the social media feeds keep spewing at us the banal hot takes of those with inflammatory, divisive views but little understanding at all of that terrifying vulnerability.

This is a period when I regret not having a stronger spiritual belief. I lament, because having faith in humanity – in our potential for kindness – has let us down so acutely. Something else, something higher, is needed.

And yet from the atrocity of Bondi we have witnessed such profound instances of human goodness. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The selflessness of bystanders. First responders – law enforcement and paramedics, those who ran towards the gunfire to help others, some publicly hailed but for the most part anonymous and unheralded.

When the police tape still fluttered in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of community, religious and ethnic solidarity was laudably championed by faith leaders. It was a call of love and tolerance – of bringing together rather than splitting apart in a moment of targeted violence.

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

Togetherness, hope and love was the message of faith.

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

And yet elements of the Australian polity reacted so disgustingly swiftly with division, finger-pointing and accusation.

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

Witness the dangerous rhetoric of disunity from veteran agitators of Australian racial division, capitalizing on the attack before the site was even cold. Then read the statements of leadership aspirants while the probe was still active.

Government has a formidable task to do when it comes to bringing together a nation that is grieving and frightened and seeking the light and, importantly, answers to so many uncertainties.

Like why, when the official terror alert was assessed as probable, did such a significant public Hanukah event go ahead with such a woefully insufficient protection? Like how could the alleged killers have multiple firearms in the family home when the domestic intelligence organisation has so openly and consistently warned of the threat of targeted attacks?

How quickly we were subjected to that tired argument (or versions of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that kill. Naturally, each point are valid. It’s feasible to simultaneously pursue new ways to prevent violent bigotry and keep firearms away from its possible perpetrators.

In this metropolis of profound splendor, of clear azure skies above ocean and shore, the water and the coastline – our shared community spaces – may not look quite the same again to the multitude who’ve noted that famous Bondi seems so jarringly out of place with last weekend’s obscene violence.

We long right now for understanding and significance, for loved ones, and perhaps for the consolation of beauty 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, anger, sadness, confusion and loss we require each other more than ever.

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

But sadly, all of the indicators are that cohesion in public life and society will be elusive this long, enervating summer.