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Initially, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas militant delegation in Qatar seemed like another escalation that pushed the hope of a ceasefire out of reach.

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

Diplomacy appeared to be collapsing.

However, it turned out to be a pivotal event that culminated in a agreement, declared by President Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

This is a goal that he, and Joe Biden before him, had sought for almost 24 months.

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

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

Trump's distinct approach and crucial relationships with the Israeli government and the Middle Eastern nations appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

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

Strong Ties That Biden Never Had

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

Trump likes to say that the nation has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has called Trump as Israel's "most supportive friend in the US presidency". Moreover these positive statements have been backed up by deeds.

During his first presidential term, the president relocated the American diplomatic mission in the country from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and abandoned a traditional American stance that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are against international law, the position under global norms.

When Israel began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in the summer, the US leader directed US bombers to target the Iran's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

Those visible shows of backing may have given the president the leeway to apply more pressure on Israel behind the scenes. As per sources, the president's negotiator, his representative, browbeat the prime minister in late 2024 into agreeing to a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the release of some hostages.

After Israel attacked against Syria's military in July, even bombing a Christian church, Trump pressured his counterpart to change course.

The leader displayed a level of will and insistence on an Israel's leader that is rarely seen, according to an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "There is no example of an American president literally telling an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

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

The Biden team's "bear hug strategy" held that the United States had to support Israel openly in order to allow it to influence the nation's war conduct behind closed doors.

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

In the end, internal considerations or personal relationships may have had less importance than the reality that, during Biden's presidency, Israel was unwilling to make peace.

Several months into Trump's second term, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its immediate north significantly reduced and the coastal strip devastated, every one of its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Business History Helped Secure Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a local national but not the intended targets, led the president to deliver an ultimatum to the prime minister. Hostilities had to end.

The US leader had allowed Israel a significant latitude in Gaza. He lent US armed support to Israeli operations in Iran. However an strike on Qatar soil was a different matter completely, moving him closer to the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several Trump officials have told media outlets that this was a decisive moment which motivated the president to exert maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

This US president's strong connections with the Gulf states are widely known. He has commercial interests with Qatar and the UAE. The president began each of his administrations with official trips to the kingdom. Recently, he also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

His Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, including the Emirates, was the biggest foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

The time he spent in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months helped shift his perspective, says an expert of the Council on Foreign Relations. Trump did not visit the country on this regional tour but went to the UAE, the kingdom and the state where the leader received repeated calls to bring an end to the war.

Within weeks after that attack on the city, the president was present close as Netanyahu personally phoned the Qatari leadership to express regret. Subsequently, the prime minister signed off on the president's 20-point peace plan for Gaza - one that also had the backing of key Muslim nations in the area.

If Trump's alliance with his counterpart provided him the ability to pressure Israel to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have ensured their support, and helped them convince the group to agree to the arrangement.

"A key factor that evidently occurred was that President Trump developed influence with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," says Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. The capacity to achieve this on his own schedule, and not succumb to the demands of the combatants has been a problem that many earlier administrations have faced, and Trump seems to handle with some success."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in Israel than Netanyahu himself was leverage that Trump employed to his benefit, the expert continues.

Currently the Israeli government has committed to freeing more than 1,000 Palestinians imprisoned in its jails and has consented to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

The group will free all the remaining hostages, living and dead, captured during the original 7 October Hamas attack, which resulted in the death of over 1,200 Israeli citizens.

A conclusion to the war, which has led to the destruction of the territory and the fatalities of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal