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Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas negotiating team in Doha seemed like yet another escalation that pushed the prospect of a ceasefire further away.

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

Negotiations appeared to be collapsing.

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

That represents a goal that Trump, and President Joe Biden previously, had pursued for nearly two years.

It is just the first step towards a more durable peace, and the specifics of disarming Hamas, administering Gaza and complete Israeli pullout remain to be worked out.

Yet if this agreement stands, it could be Trump's defining accomplishment of his second term - one that escaped Biden and his administration.

The president's distinct approach and key alliances with Israel and the Arab world seem to have played a role in this breakthrough.

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

A Close Relationship That Eluded Biden

In public, Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

Trump often states that Israel has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has described Trump as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". Moreover these warm words have been backed up by actions.

During his initial time in office, the president moved the US embassy in the country from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and discarded a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, the position under international law.

When Israel began its air strikes against Iran in June, the US leader ordered US bombers to target the nation's atomic sites with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

These visible shows of support may have given Trump the leeway to exert more pressure on the Israeli government in private. As per sources, the president's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, pressured Netanyahu in late 2024 into agreeing to a halt in fighting in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

After Israel launched strikes against Syria's military in the summer, even bombing a place of worship, the US president pressured Netanyahu to change course.

Trump displayed a level of will and insistence on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, according to Aaron David Miller of the a think tank. "It's unheard of of an US leader directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

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

His administration's "bear hug approach" argued that the US had to embrace the nation openly in order to enable it to moderate the nation's war conduct in private.

Underneath this was the president's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as sharp divisions within his political base over the conflict in Gaza. Every step Biden took endangered dividing his own political backing, whereas Trump's solid Republican base gave him more room to manoeuvre.

In the end, internal considerations or individual ties may have had less importance than the reality that, during his term, Israel was not ready to reach an agreement.

Eight months into Trump's second term, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its immediate north significantly reduced and Gaza devastated, every one of its key military goals had been accomplished.

Business History Assisted Secure Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in Doha, which resulted in the death of a local national but no Hamas officials, led the president to deliver an final demand to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

The US leader had given the Israeli military a significant latitude in Gaza. He provided US armed support to Israeli operations in Iran. However an attack on Qatar soil was a separate issue entirely, moving him closer to the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several administration figures have told the press that this was a decisive moment which motivated the president to apply maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

The leader's close ties with the Gulf states are widely known. He has commercial interests with the emirate and the United Arab Emirates. He began each of his administrations with official trips to the kingdom. Recently, Trump also stopped in Qatar and the UAE capital.

The president's normalization agreements, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and several Muslim states, such as the Emirates, was the biggest diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

The time he spent in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months contributed to shift his perspective, says an expert of the a policy institute. Trump did not travel to Israel on this Middle East trip but went to the UAE, 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, Trump was present nearby as Netanyahu personally called Qatar to express regret. Subsequently, the prime minister gave approval on the president's 20-point peace plan for Gaza - one that also had the backing of influential Arab states in the area.

If Trump's relationship with Netanyahu gave him the ability to influence the government to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have secured their support, and assisted them persuade the group to commit to the deal.

"A key factor that clearly happened was that the US leader developed leverage with the Israeli government, and through intermediaries with the militants," notes an analyst of the a research center.

"This was crucial. His ability to achieve this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a problem that lot of previous presidents have struggled with, and Trump appears to handle with some success."

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

Currently Israel has agreed to freeing over a thousand detainees held in its jails and has agreed to a limited pullback from Gaza.

Hamas will release all the captives still held, living and dead, captured during the original 7 October assault, which resulted in the death of over 1,200 Israeli citizens.

An end to the war, which has led to the devastation of Gaza and the deaths of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal