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At first, Israel's air strike on the Hamas negotiating team in Doha seemed like yet another escalation that pushed the prospect of peace out of reach.

The attack on September 9 breached the sovereignty of an American ally and risked expanding the conflict into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations appeared to be in ruins.

However, it turned out to be a key moment that has led in a agreement, declared by Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

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

It is just the initial phase towards a more durable peace, and the details of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and full Israeli withdrawal are still to be negotiated.

Yet if this deal holds, it could be Donald Trump's signature achievement of his second term - one that escaped Joe Biden and his administration.

Trump's distinct approach and crucial relationships with the Israeli government and the Arab world appear to have contributed in this breakthrough.

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

A Close Relationship That Biden Never Had

Publicly, Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

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". And these warm words have been backed up by actions.

During his initial time in office, Trump relocated the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and discarded a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are against international law, the view under international law.

When Israel began its air strikes against the Islamic Republic in June, the US leader ordered American aircraft to target the nation's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

Those visible shows of support may have given Trump the leeway to exert more influence on the Israeli government in private. According to reports, the president's envoy, his representative, browbeat the prime minister in late 2024 into agreeing to a halt in fighting in return for the release of some hostages.

When Israel launched strikes against Syrian forces in July, even hitting a Christian church, Trump urged Netanyahu to alter tactics.

Trump displayed a degree of will and insistence on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, according to an analyst of the a think tank. "There is no example of an US leader directly instructing an Israeli leader that they must agree or else."

Biden's relationship with the Israeli administration was always more strained.

His administration's "bear hug strategy" argued that the US had to support the nation publicly in order to enable it to influence the nation's war conduct in private.

Underneath this was Biden's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Every step the leader took endangered fracturing his own domestic support, whereas Trump's solid Republican base provided him more flexibility to act.

In the end, domestic politics or personal relationships may have had less importance than the reality that, throughout Biden's presidency, the Israeli government was unwilling to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with Iran weakened, Hezbollah to its immediate north significantly reduced and Gaza devastated, all its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Commercial Background Helped Gain Support from Arab States

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which killed 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 relatively free hand in Gaza. The president provided American military might to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. However an strike on Qatari territory was a different matter entirely, moving him closer to the Arab position on how best to end the war.

Several Trump officials have informed the press that this was a decisive moment which galvanised the president to exert maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

This US president's close ties with the Gulf states are well documented. He has commercial interests with Qatar and the UAE. The president began both his presidential terms with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also stopped in Qatar and the UAE capital.

His normalization agreements, which established ties between Israel and a number of Arab nations, including the UAE, was the most significant foreign policy success of his first term.

The time he spent in the cities of the Gulf region earlier this year helped change his thinking, says Ed Husain of the Council on Foreign Relations. Trump did not visit Israel on this regional tour but went to the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and the state where the leader received consistent appeals to put a stop to the war.

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

Assuming the president's relationship with his counterpart gave him the ability to pressure the government to strike a deal, his past with Arab rulers may have secured their support, and assisted them persuade the group to commit to the deal.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that the US leader gained leverage with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," notes Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. The capacity to do this on his timing, and not succumb to the desires of the combatants has been a problem that many earlier administrations have faced, and he seems to do with some success."

The fact that the president is much more popular in Israel than Netanyahu personally was leverage that he employed to his advantage, he adds.

Now the Israeli government has committed to freeing over a thousand Palestinians held in its jails and has consented to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

Hamas will release all the captives still held, living and dead, taken during the original 7 October Hamas attack, which caused the loss of more than 1,200 Israelis.

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