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As Australia winds down for a traditional Christmas holiday across languorous days of coast and blistering heat accompanied by the background of sporting matches and insect sounds, this year the nation's summer atmosphere seems, unfortunately, like no other.

It would be a dramatic understatement to describe the collective temperament after the anti-Jewish violent assault on Jewish Australians during Bondi Hanukah celebrations as one of mere ennui.

Across the country, but nowhere more so than in Sydney – the most postcard picturesque of the nation's urban centers – a tenor of initial surprise, grief and horror is segueing to fury and deep division.

Those who had previously missed the often voiced concerns of Australian Jews are now highly attuned. Just as, they are attuned to reconciling the need for a far more urgent, energetic government and institutional crackdown against anti-Jewish hatred with the freedom to demonstrate against mass atrocities.

If ever there was a time for a national listening, it is now, when our faith in mankind is so sorely diminished. This is particularly so for those of us fortunate enough never to have endured the hatred and dread of faith-based persecution on this land or elsewhere.

And yet the social media feeds keep churning out at us the trite instant opinions of those with inflammatory, divisive views but little understanding at all of that profound fragility.

This is a period when I regret not having a greater faith. I mourn, because having faith in humanity – in our capacity for kindness – has let us down so acutely. A different source, a greater power, is needed.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have seen such profound instances of human goodness. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The selflessness of bystanders. First responders – law enforcement and paramedics, those who charged into the danger to help fellow humans, 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 social, religious and ethnic unity was admirably championed by faith leaders. It was a call of compassion and acceptance – of bringing together rather than dividing in a time of targeted violence.

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

Unity, light and love was the message of faith.

‘Our shared community spaces may not appear quite the same again.’

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

Some politicians gravitated straight for the darkness, using tragedy as a calculating chance to question Australia’s migration rules.

Witness the harmful message of division from longstanding fomenters of societal discord, exploiting the massacre before the crime scene was even cold. Then consider the statements of leadership aspirants while the probe was ongoing.

Government has a daunting task to do when it comes to uniting a nation that is mourning and frightened and looking for the light and, not least, answers to so many questions.

Like why, when the national terrorism threat level was assessed as probable, did such a significant open-air Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a grossly insufficient protection? Like how could the accused attackers have six guns in the family home when the domestic intelligence organisation has so openly and consistently alerted of the danger of targeted attacks?

How rapidly we were treated to that cliched line (or iterations of it) that it’s individuals not guns that kill. Of course, each point are true. It’s possible to simultaneously pursue new ways to stop hate-fuelled violence and prevent guns away from its potential actors.

In this city of profound splendor, of clear blue heavens above ocean and shore, the ocean and the beaches – our communal areas – may not seem entirely familiar again to the multitude who’ve observed that famous Bondi seems so incongruous with last weekend’s obscene violence.

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

This weekend many Australians are cancelling Christmas party plans. Quiet contemplation will feel more appropriate.

But this is perhaps somewhat counterintuitive. For in these times of fear, outrage, melancholy, bewilderment and grief we require each other now more than ever.

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

But tragically, all of the portents are that unity in politics and the community will be elusive this long, enervating summer.