As the nation winds down for a customary Christmas holiday during slow-moving days of coast and blistering heat set to the soundtrack of sporting matches and cicada song, this year the country’s summer atmosphere feels, sadly, like no other.
It would be a significant understatement to characterize the collective disposition after the antisemitic violent assault on Australian Jews during Bondi Hanukah celebrations as one of mere ennui.
Throughout the country, but especially than in Sydney – the most iconically beautiful of the nation's urban centers – a tenor of immediate shock, grief and horror is segueing to anger 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 fight against antisemitism with the freedom to demonstrate against genocide.
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 experienced the hatred and dread of faith-based targeting on this land or elsewhere.
And yet the algorithms keep churning out at us the trite instant opinions of those with inflammatory, polarizing views but little understanding at all of that profound vulnerability.
This is a time when I lament not having a stronger faith. I lament, because believing in people – in mankind’s potential for compassion – has failed us so acutely. A different source, 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 bravery of those present. Emergency personnel – police officers and paramedics, those who ran towards the danger to aid fellow humans, some recognised but for the most part anonymous and unheralded.
When the police tape still fluttered wildly all about Bondi, the necessity of social, religious and ethnic solidarity was laudably promoted by religious figures. It was a message of love and acceptance – of unifying rather than splitting apart in a time of antisemitic slaughter.
In keeping with the symbolism of the Festival of Lights (illumination amid darkness), there was so much fitting evocation of the need for lightness.
Togetherness, light and compassion was the message of faith.
‘Our shared community spaces may not look exactly as they did again.’
And yet elements of the political landscape responded so nauseatingly swiftly with fragmentation, finger-pointing and accusation.
Some politicians moved straight for the darkness, using the atrocity as a cynical opportunity to challenge Australia’s immigration policies.
Witness the harmful rhetoric of division from veteran fomenters of Australian racial division, capitalizing on the massacre before the site was even cold. Then read the statements of leadership aspirants while the investigation was ongoing.
Politics has a daunting job to do when it comes to uniting a nation that is grieving and frightened and looking for the light and, importantly, explanations to so many questions.
Like why, when the national terrorism threat level was assessed as likely, did such a large open-air Hanukah celebration go ahead with such a woefully insufficient security presence? Like how could the alleged killers have six guns in the residence when the security agency has so openly and repeatedly alerted of the danger of antisemitic violence?
How quickly we were subjected to that cliched line (or iterations of it) that it’s individuals not weapons that kill. Of course, both things are valid. It’s possible to at the same time pursue new ways to stop hate-fuelled violence and prevent firearms away from its potential actors.
In this city of profound splendor, of clear azure skies above ocean and sand, the water and the beaches – our communal areas – may not look entirely familiar again to the multitude who’ve noted that iconic Bondi seems so jarringly out of place with last weekend’s obscene bloodshed.
We yearn right now for comprehension and significance, for family, and perhaps for the consolation of beauty in art or the natural world.
This weekend many Australians are cancelling Christmas party plans. Quiet contemplation will feel more appropriate.
But this is perhaps counterintuitively against instinct. For in these times of anxiety, anger, sadness, confusion and grief we need each other more than ever.
The reassurance of community – the human glue of the unity in the very word – is what we probably need most.
But sadly, all of the portents are that cohesion in politics and society will be elusive this extended, enervating summer.
Elara is a seasoned gaming journalist with a passion for slot mechanics and player strategies.
