🔗 Share this article

While the nation winds down for a traditional Christmas holiday during languorous days of coast and blistering heat set to the soundtrack of sporting matches and insect sounds, this year the nation's summer mood seems, sadly, like no other.

It would be a dramatic oversimplification to characterize the collective disposition after the antisemitic 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 iconically beautiful of Australian cities – a tone of immediate surprise, sorrow and terror is segueing to fury and bitter polarization.

Those who had previously missed the frequently expressed fears of the Jewish community are now acutely aware. Similarly, they are sensitive to reconciling the need for a much more immediate, vigorous official crackdown against antisemitism with the freedom to demonstrate against mass atrocities.

If ever there was a moment for a countrywide dialogue, it is now, when our faith in mankind is so sorely diminished. This is especially so for those of us fortunate enough never to have endured the animosity and dread of religious and ethnic persecution on this continent or elsewhere.

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

This is a time when I regret not having a greater spiritual belief. I lament, because having faith in humanity – in mankind’s capacity for kindness – has let us down so acutely. A different source, something higher, is required.

And yet from the horror of Bondi we have seen such profound examples of human decency. The courageous acts of ordinary people. The bravery of those present. First responders – law enforcement and medical staff, those who charged into the gunfire to help others, some publicly hailed but for the most part unnamed and unsung.

When the barrier cordon still waved wildly all about Bondi, the necessity of social, faith-based and ethnic solidarity was admirably promoted by religious figures. It was a call of love and acceptance – of unifying rather than dividing in a time of antisemitic slaughter.

In keeping with the meaning of the Festival of Lights (illumination amid darkness), there was so much fitting reference of the need for lightness.

Unity, light and compassion was the message of faith.

‘Our shared community spaces may not appear exactly as they did again.’

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

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

Observe the dangerous message of disunity from longstanding fomenters of societal discord, capitalizing on the attack before the crime scene was even cold. Then consider the statements of leadership aspirants while the investigation was ongoing.

Politics has a daunting job to do when it comes to bringing together a nation that is mourning and frightened and seeking the light and, not least, explanations to so many uncertainties.

Like why, when the national terrorism threat level was assessed as probable, did such a large public Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a grossly inadequate protection? Like how could the alleged killers have multiple firearms in the family home when the domestic intelligence organisation has so publicly and consistently warned of the threat of targeted attacks?

How quickly we were treated to that cliched argument (or iterations of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that kill. Of course, each point are valid. It’s feasible to at the same time seek new ways to stop hate-fuelled violence and prevent guns away from its potential actors.

In this metropolis of profound splendor, of clear blue heavens above ocean and sand, the ocean and the coastline – our communal areas – may not look entirely familiar again to the multitude who’ve observed that iconic Bondi seems so jarringly out of place with last weekend’s obscene violence.

We long right now for understanding and significance, for family, 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 against instinct. For in these times of fear, outrage, melancholy, confusion and loss we require each other more than ever.

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

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