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Initially, the Israeli air strike on the Hamas negotiating team in Doha seemed like another escalation that drove the prospect of a ceasefire further away.

This strike on 9 September breached the territorial integrity of an American ally and threatened widening the conflict into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations appeared to be in ruins.

However, it turned out to be a pivotal event that has led in a deal, announced by Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

This is a goal that Trump, and Joe Biden before him, had sought for nearly two years.

It is just the initial phase towards a lasting resolution, and the specifics of disarming Hamas, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be negotiated.

But if this deal holds, it could be Trump's defining accomplishment of his return to office - one that escaped Biden and his diplomatic team.

The president's distinct approach and crucial relationships with Israel and the Arab world seem to have contributed in this success.

But, as with many diplomatic achievements, there were also elements involved beyond the influence of either man.

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

Trump often states that the nation has no better friend, and Netanyahu has called him as Israel's "most supportive friend in the US presidency". And these warm words have been backed up by deeds.

Throughout his initial time in office, the president moved the US embassy in Israel from its former location to the contested capital and discarded a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are against international law, the view under global norms.

After the Israeli military began its air strikes against the Islamic Republic in June, Trump directed American aircraft to strike the nation's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These visible shows of support may have allowed the president the leeway to apply more influence on the Israeli government behind the scenes. According to reports, the president's envoy, Steve Witkoff, browbeat the prime minister in late 2024 into accepting a temporary ceasefire in return for the release of some hostages.

After Israeli forces launched strikes against Syrian forces in July, even bombing a Christian church, the US president pressured Netanyahu to alter tactics.

The leader exhibited a level of will and insistence on an Israeli prime minister that is virtually unprecedented, according to an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "It's unheard of of an US leader literally telling an Israeli leader that you're going to have to comply or else."

Biden's relationship with Netanyahu's government was always more strained.

The Biden team's "bear hug approach" argued that the United States had to embrace Israel openly in order to allow it to moderate the nation's war conduct behind closed doors.

Underneath this was the president's nearly half-century of support for the state, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Each move the leader took endangered fracturing his own political backing, while Trump's solid Republican base gave him more room to manoeuvre.

In the end, internal considerations or personal relationships may have had little impact than the reality that, during his term, Israel was not ready to make peace.

Several months into Trump's second term, with Iran weakened, the militant group to its immediate north significantly reduced and the coastal strip devastated, every one of its key military goals had been achieved.

Commercial Background Assisted Secure Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which killed a local national but not the intended targets, prompted the president to deliver an final demand to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to end.

Trump had allowed the Israeli military a relatively free hand in the territory. The president provided US armed support to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. But an strike on Qatari territory was a different matter entirely, moving him closer to the Arab position on how best to end the war.

A number of Trump officials have informed the press that this was a turning point which galvanised the leader to apply full force to finalize an agreement.

This US president's close ties with the Gulf states are widely known. Trump has commercial interests with the emirate and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with official trips to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also visited in Doha and the UAE capital.

The president's normalization agreements, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, such as the Emirates, was the most significant foreign policy success of his first term.

His visits devoted in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula earlier this year contributed to change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. Trump did not travel to Israel on this Middle East trip but visited the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and the state where the leader heard consistent appeals to put a stop to the war.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on Doha, the president sat close as the prime minister himself phoned the Qatari leadership to apologise. Subsequently, the prime minister gave approval on Trump's comprehensive proposal for the territory - one that also had the support of influential Arab states in the region.

If Trump's alliance with Netanyahu provided him the room to pressure Israel to strike a deal, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their support, and assisted them persuade the group to agree to the deal.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that the US leader developed leverage with the Israelis, and through intermediaries with Hamas," says an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. His ability to achieve this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a challenge that many previous presidents have struggled with, and he appears to handle relatively successfully."

The fact that the president is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister himself was an advantage that he used to his advantage, he adds.

Now the Israeli government has committed to releasing over a thousand Palestinians imprisoned in Israeli prisons and has consented to a limited pullback from Gaza.

The group will release all the remaining hostages, both alive and deceased, taken in the initial October 7 assault, which caused the death of over 1,200 Israeli citizens.

A conclusion to the conflict, which has resulted in the destruction of Gaza and the deaths of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal