On sunny Fridays, Dizengoff Street, the heart of Tel Aviv's proudly scruffy strip of cafés and saloons, hosts long afternoons of coffee and light drinks that gently carry its patrons towards a night of partying.
Last Friday, the languor was interrupted by the rat-a-tat of a semi-automatic weapon that left two people dead and the city on edge.
Rain poured down on Israel over the weekend, so it was difficult to tell if Dizengoff was empty due to the weather or due to the terror, but all signs pointed to the latter. Shuttered locales had hung notices of mourning. Both Arab and Jews, it appeared, were too frightened to return to work as the gunman remained on the loose.
Along the street, skittish women were buying groceries with their children, kept away from school. The Tel Aviv municipality reported that fully half of the school-age children from north Tel Aviv were absent on Sunday and Monday.
Ari Samuel, 29, an American immigrant working in advertising, said: "I think the personal attacks are definitely different to missiles. I've been here four years, and I've been through two wars with missiles, but not really gunmen shooting up bars. Tel Aviv is a paradise, an urban paradise, so when you live in a place like this you tend to forget where you are in the world."
That luxurious calm seems to have been shattered, despite the fact that Friday's attack was not the first in Tel Aviv since the surge of Palestinian violence began in early October.
At a vintage shop, Edna Banet, a Jerusalemite, argued edgily with Elisha Regev, a collector of Israeli artifacts from Herzliya, about the reaction of Tel Avivis to the shooting. "There was an attack in Tel Aviv, and now suddenly you all take off," she said. "We've been having attacks in Jerusalem daily. Yesterday there were two stabbings, and no one is saying a word!"
"In some way it has had an impact on residents and on every individual," Mr Samuel said. "Obviously, it could happen anywhere in the world. It could happen in New York, in London, in Paris, obviously. But I think that people in Tel Aviv will probably continue as scheduled. The city doesn't really stop for that kind of thing."
To get more from opinion, click here to sign up for our free Editor's Picks newsletter.