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While Australia winds down for a customary Christmas holiday across slow-moving days of beach and blistering heat set to the background of Test cricket and cicada song, this year the country’s summer atmosphere seems, unfortunately, like no other.

It would be a dramatic understatement to describe the national disposition after the antisemitic terrorist attack on Jewish Australians during Bondi Hanukah festivities as one of mere discontent.

Throughout the country, but especially than in Sydney – the most postcard picturesque of Australian cities – a tenor of immediate shock, grief and horror is segueing to fury and bitter polarization.

Those who had previously missed the frequently expressed concerns of the Jewish community are now highly attuned. Just as, they are attuned to balancing the need for a much more immediate, vigorous government and institutional fight against anti-Jewish hatred with the freedom to demonstrate against mass atrocities.

If ever there was a time for a countrywide dialogue, it is now, when our belief in humanity is so sorely depleted. This is particularly so for those of us lucky never to have endured the hatred and dread of religious and ethnic targeting on this land or elsewhere.

And yet the social media feeds keep churning out at us the trite instant opinions of those with blistering, divisive stances but no sense at all of that profound fragility.

This is a period when I lament not having a greater faith. I lament, because having faith in people – in our potential for compassion – has failed us so painfully. A different source, a greater power, is needed.

And yet from the atrocity of Bondi we have seen such profound examples of human decency. The heroism of individuals. The selflessness of bystanders. First responders – law enforcement and medical staff, those who ran towards the danger to help others, some publicly hailed but for the most part unnamed and unsung.

When the police tape still waved wildly all about Bondi, the necessity of community, faith-based and ethnic solidarity was admirably promoted by faith leaders. It was a message of compassion and tolerance – of unifying rather than dividing in a moment of antisemitic slaughter.

In keeping with the meaning of the Festival of Lights (light amid gloom), there was so much appropriate evocation of the need for hope.

Togetherness, hope and compassion was the message of faith.

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

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

Some elected officials gravitated straight for the darkness, using the atrocity as a cynical chance to challenge Australia’s immigration policies.

Observe the dangerous rhetoric of disunity from veteran fomenters of societal discord, exploiting the attack before the site was even cold. Then consider the words of leadership aspirants while the probe was ongoing.

Politics has a daunting task to do when it comes to bringing together a nation that is mourning and scared and seeking the hope and, not least, explanations to so many questions.

Like why, when the official terror alert was assessed as probable, did such a significant public Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a grossly insufficient protection? Like how could the alleged killers have six guns in the family home when the security agency has so publicly and consistently alerted of the danger of antisemitic violence?

How quickly we were treated to that cliched line (or iterations of it) that it’s people not guns that kill. Naturally, both things are valid. It’s feasible to simultaneously pursue new ways to stop violent bigotry and keep firearms away from its potential actors.

In this city of profound beauty, of clear blue heavens above sea and shore, the water and the beaches – our communal areas – may not seem quite the same again to the multitude who’ve noted that iconic Bondi seems so incongruous with last weekend’s horrific violence.

We long right now for understanding and meaning, for family, and perhaps for the consolation of beauty in art or nature.

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

But this is perhaps counterintuitively counterintuitive. For in these days of fear, outrage, melancholy, confusion and grief we need each other more than ever.

The reassurance 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 extended, enervating summer.