The Initial Shock and Fear of the Bondi Shooting Is Giving Way to Rage and Discord. We Must Look For the Hope.

While Australia settles into for a customary Christmas holiday across languorous days of coast and blistering heat set to the background of Test cricket and insect sounds, this year the country’s summer mood seems, sadly, like none before.

It would be a significant oversimplification to describe the national temperament after the antisemitic violent assault on Australian Jews during the beachside Hanukah festivities as one of mere ennui.

Throughout the country, but nowhere more so than in Sydney – the most postcard picturesque of Australian cities – a tone of initial surprise, grief and terror is segueing to fury and deep division.

Those who had not picked up on the frequently expressed concerns of the Jewish community are now highly attuned. Just as, they are attuned to reconciling the need for a much more immediate, vigorous government and institutional crackdown against antisemitism with the right to demonstrate against mass atrocities.

If ever there was a time for a national listening, it is now, when our belief in humanity is so deeply diminished. This is especially so for those of us lucky never to have experienced the hatred and dread of faith-based persecution on this land or elsewhere.

And yet the algorithms keep spewing at us the trite hot takes of those with inflammatory, polarizing stances but no sense at all of that profound vulnerability.

This is a time when I lament not having a stronger faith. I mourn, because believing in humanity – in our potential for kindness – has failed us so acutely. A different source, a greater power, is required.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have witnessed such extreme examples of human decency. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The selflessness of bystanders. Emergency personnel – police officers and medical staff, those who ran towards the danger to help fellow humans, some recognised but for the most part anonymous and unheralded.

When the barrier cordon still fluttered in the wind all about Bondi, the imperative of social, faith-based and ethnic solidarity was admirably championed by faith leaders. It was a call of compassion and tolerance – of bringing together rather than dividing in a moment of targeted violence.

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

Unity, light and love was the essence of faith.

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

Some elected officials moved straight for the darkness, using tragedy as a calculating chance to challenge Australia’s migration rules.

Observe the dangerous rhetoric of disunity from longstanding fomenters 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 formidable task to do when it comes to uniting a nation that is mourning and frightened and seeking the hope and, not least, answers to so many questions.

Like why, when the official terror alert was judged as probable, did such a significant public Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a woefully inadequate protection? Like how could the alleged killers have multiple firearms in the residence when the domestic intelligence organisation has so openly and consistently warned of the danger of targeted attacks?

How quickly we were subjected to that tired line (or iterations of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that cause death. Naturally, both things are true. It’s possible to simultaneously pursue new ways to stop hate-fuelled violence and keep firearms away from its possible actors.

In this city of immense splendor, of pristine azure skies above ocean and shore, the water and the beaches – our shared community spaces – may not seem entirely familiar again to the many who’ve noted 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 beauty in art or the natural world.

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

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

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

But sadly, all of the indicators are that unity in politics and society will be hard to find this long, enervating summer.