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Initially, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas negotiating team in Doha seemed like another escalation that drove the hope of a ceasefire further away.

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

Negotiations appeared to be collapsing.

However, it turned out to be a key moment that culminated in a deal, announced by Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

That represents a objective that he, and Joe Biden previously, had pursued for almost 24 months.

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

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

The president's unique style and crucial relationships with Israel and the Middle Eastern nations appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

But, as with most foreign policy wins, there were also factors involved beyond the control of both leaders.

Strong Ties Which Biden Never Had

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

The president likes to say that Israel has no better friend, and the Israeli leader has called him as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the White House". And these positive statements have been backed up by actions.

Throughout his first presidential term, Trump moved the American diplomatic mission in the country from its former location to Jerusalem and abandoned a traditional American stance that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are against international law, the view under global norms.

When Israel began its air strikes against Iran in the summer, Trump ordered US bombers to target the Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These public demonstrations of support may have allowed the president the leeway to apply more pressure on Israel in private. As per sources, the president's negotiator, his representative, pressured the prime minister in late 2024 into accepting a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the release of a number of captives.

After Israeli forces launched strikes against Syria's military in the summer, even hitting a Christian church, the US president pressured Netanyahu to alter tactics.

The leader exhibited 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 US leader literally telling an Israeli prime minister that they must agree or else."

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

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 war conduct behind closed doors.

Beneath this was Biden's decades-long of backing for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the conflict in Gaza. Every step the leader took risked fracturing his own political backing, whereas Trump's solid Republican base gave him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, domestic politics or individual ties may have had little impact than the reality that, throughout his term, Israel was not ready to make peace.

Eight months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic chastened, Hezbollah to its immediate north significantly reduced and Gaza in ruins, every one of its key military goals had been accomplished.

Business History Helped Secure Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, led Trump to deliver an final demand to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

Trump had allowed Israel a relatively free hand in the territory. The president lent US armed support to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. But an strike on Qatar soil was a separate issue completely, pushing him closer to the Arab position on how best to end the war.

Several Trump officials have informed the press that this was a turning point which galvanised the president to exert full force to finalize an agreement.

The leader's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are widely known. Trump has commercial interests with the emirate and the UAE. He began each of his administrations with state visits to the kingdom. Recently, Trump also stopped in Qatar and Abu Dhabi.

His normalization agreements, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and several Muslim states, including the UAE, was the most significant foreign policy success of his first term.

The time he spent in the capitals of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months helped change his thinking, according to an expert of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not visit the country on this regional tour but visited the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where he received consistent appeals to bring an end to the war.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on Doha, the president was present nearby as Netanyahu himself phoned the Qatari leadership to express regret. Subsequently, the Israeli leader signed off on the president's 20-point peace plan for Gaza - one that also had the support of influential Arab states in the area.

Assuming the president's relationship with his counterpart gave him the room to influence Israel to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have ensured their backing, and helped them convince the group to commit to the deal.

"A key factor that clearly happened was that the US leader gained influence with the Israeli government, and indirectly with Hamas," notes Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. The capacity to do this on his timing, and not succumb to the demands of the combatants has been a challenge that lot of previous presidents have struggled with, and he seems to do with some success."

The fact that Trump is far better liked in the nation than the prime minister himself was an advantage that he employed to his benefit, the expert continues.

Currently Israel has agreed to releasing over a thousand detainees held in Israeli prisons and has consented to a limited pullback from Gaza.

The group will release all the captives still held, living and dead, taken during the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which resulted in the loss of more than 1,200 Israelis.

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