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Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas negotiating team in Qatar appeared like yet another escalation that pushed the hope of peace out of reach.

The attack on 9 September breached the territorial integrity of an American ally and risked widening the conflict into a region-wide war.

Negotiations appeared to be collapsing.

Instead, it proved to be a pivotal event that culminated in a agreement, declared by Donald Trump, to release all captives still held.

This is a goal that he, and President Joe Biden previously, had pursued for almost 24 months.

This marks just the initial phase towards a lasting resolution, and the details of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and complete Israeli pullout are still to be worked out.

Yet if this deal holds, it could be Trump's defining accomplishment of his second term - one that eluded Biden and his administration.

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

However, as with many foreign policy wins, there were also factors at play beyond the influence of both leaders.

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

Publicly, Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

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

Throughout his first presidential term, the president moved the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and discarded a long-held US position that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, the position under global norms.

When the Israeli military began its bombing campaign against Iran in the summer, the US leader ordered US bombers to strike the Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities with its most powerful conventional bombs.

Those visible shows of backing may have allowed Trump the leeway to exert more influence on the Israeli government behind the scenes. As per sources, Trump's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, browbeat the prime minister in late 2024 into accepting a halt in fighting in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

When Israeli forces launched strikes against Syrian forces in July, even hitting a place of worship, the US president urged Netanyahu to alter tactics.

Trump exhibited a degree of determination and insistence on an Israel's leader that is virtually unprecedented, according to an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "It's unheard of of an American president directly instructing an Israeli leader that they must agree or else."

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

The Biden team's "close embrace approach" argued that the United States had to support the nation publicly in order to enable it to moderate the nation's war conduct in private.

Underneath this was the president's decades-long of support for the state, as well as sharp divisions within his political base over the Gaza War. Each move Biden took risked fracturing his own political backing, whereas his successor's solid Republican base gave him more flexibility to act.

In the end, internal considerations or personal relationships may have had little impact than the simple fact that, during Biden's presidency, Israel was not ready to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic weakened, Hezbollah to its northern border greatly diminished and Gaza devastated, every one of its major strategy objectives had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Helped Secure Support from Arab States

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which killed a local national but no Hamas officials, prompted Trump to issue an final demand to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

The US leader had given the Israeli military a relatively free hand in Gaza. He lent US armed support to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. However an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue completely, moving him towards the Arab position on how best to end the war.

A number of Trump officials have informed media outlets that this was a decisive moment which motivated the leader to exert full force to get a peace deal done.

This US president's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are well documented. He has commercial interests with the emirate and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also visited in Doha and the UAE capital.

His normalization agreements, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and several Muslim states, such as the UAE, was the biggest foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

The time he spent in the capitals of the Gulf region in recent months helped change his thinking, says Ed Husain of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not visit Israel on this regional tour but visited the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and the state where he heard consistent appeals to bring an end to the conflict.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on the city, Trump was present nearby as the prime minister himself phoned the Qatari leadership to apologise. Subsequently, the Israeli leader gave approval on the president's 20-point peace plan for the territory - one that additionally had the backing of key Muslim nations in the region.

Assuming the president's alliance with Netanyahu gave him the ability to pressure Israel to strike a deal, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their support, and helped them persuade the group to commit to the deal.

"A key factor that clearly happened was that President Trump gained influence with the Israeli government, and through intermediaries with the militants," notes an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. The capacity to do this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the demands of the warring sides has been a problem that lot of previous presidents have faced, and Trump seems to do with some success."

The fact that Trump is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister himself was leverage that Trump used to his benefit, the expert continues.

Now Israel has committed to releasing over a thousand Palestinians imprisoned in its jails and has agreed to a partial withdrawal from Gaza.

Hamas will release all the remaining hostages, both alive and deceased, taken in the original 7 October Hamas attack, which caused the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

An end to the conflict, which has resulted in the destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal