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Initially, Israel's air strike on the Hamas negotiating team in Doha seemed like another intensification that drove the prospect of a ceasefire out of reach.

The attack on September 9 violated the sovereignty of an American ally and risked expanding the conflict into a region-wide war.

Diplomacy appeared to be in ruins.

However, it turned out to be a key moment that has led in a agreement, declared by President Donald Trump, to release all remaining hostages.

This is a objective that Trump, and President Joe Biden before him, had sought for almost 24 months.

It is just the first step towards a more durable peace, and the details of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and full Israeli withdrawal are still to be worked out.

But if this agreement holds, it could be Donald Trump's signature achievement of his return to office - one that eluded Biden and his administration.

The president's distinct approach and crucial relationships with Israel and the Arab world appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

However, as with most diplomatic achievements, there were also factors involved beyond the control of either man.

Strong Ties That Eluded Biden

In public, Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

The president often states that Israel has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has described him as the country's "most supportive friend in the US presidency". Moreover these positive statements have been matched by deeds.

Throughout his first presidential term, Trump relocated the US embassy in Israel from its former location to the contested capital and abandoned a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are against international law, the position under global norms.

When Israel began its bombing campaign against Iran in June, Trump directed American aircraft to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those visible shows of support may have given the president the room to exert more pressure on the Israeli government behind the scenes. According to reports, the president's envoy, his representative, browbeat Netanyahu in late 2024 into agreeing to a temporary ceasefire in return for the release of some hostages.

When Israeli forces attacked against Syria's military in July, even hitting a Christian church, Trump urged his counterpart to change course.

Trump displayed a degree of will and pressure on an Israeli prime minister that is virtually unprecedented, says an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "It's unheard of of an American president literally telling an Israeli prime minister that they must agree or else."

Joe Biden's connection with Netanyahu's government was always more tenuous.

The Biden team's "bear hug strategy" argued that the US had to embrace Israel openly in order to allow it to influence the country's military actions behind closed doors.

Beneath this was the president's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the conflict in Gaza. Each move the leader took risked fracturing his own political backing, whereas his successor's solid Republican base gave him more room to act.

Ultimately, internal considerations or individual ties may have had little impact than the reality that, during Biden's presidency, the Israeli government was unwilling to reach an agreement.

Several months into Trump's second term, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its northern border greatly diminished and the coastal strip in ruins, every one of its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Business History Assisted Gain Gulf's Backing

The Israeli missile attack in Doha, which killed a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, led Trump to deliver an ultimatum to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to stop.

Trump had given the Israeli military a significant latitude in Gaza. He lent US armed support to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. However an attack on Qatari territory was a separate issue entirely, moving him closer to the Arab position on how best to end the war.

Several Trump officials have informed media outlets that this was a decisive moment which galvanised the leader to apply full force to get a peace deal done.

This US president's strong connections with the Gulf states are widely known. Trump has business dealings with Qatar and the UAE. He began each of his administrations with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also stopped in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

His Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and several Muslim states, including the UAE, was the biggest foreign policy success of his first term.

His visits he spent in the cities of the Gulf region in recent months contributed to change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. Trump did not visit Israel on this Middle East trip but visited the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where he heard repeated calls to put a stop to the war.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on Doha, Trump was present close as Netanyahu himself phoned the Qatari leadership to express regret. And later that day, the prime minister signed off on Trump's 20-point peace plan for the territory - one that also had the support of key Muslim nations in the area.

If Trump's relationship with Netanyahu provided him the room to influence Israel to strike a deal, his past with Muslim leaders may have ensured their support, and helped them convince the group to commit to the deal.

"A key factor that evidently occurred was that the US leader developed influence with the Israelis, and through intermediaries with the militants," says Jon Alterman of the a research center.

"This was crucial. His ability to do this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a challenge that lot of previous presidents have struggled with, and Trump appears to do relatively successfully."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in the nation than the prime minister himself was leverage that Trump used to his benefit, he adds.

Currently the Israeli government has committed to releasing more than 1,000 detainees imprisoned in its jails and has agreed to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

The group will free all the captives still held, living and dead, taken during the original 7 October assault, which caused the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

A conclusion to the war, which has led to the devastation of the territory and the deaths of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal