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Initially, the Israeli air strike on the Hamas militant negotiating team in Doha appeared like another escalation that drove the hope of peace further away.

The attack on September 9 breached the sovereignty of an US partner and threatened widening the conflict into a region-wide war.

Negotiations seemed to be in ruins.

However, it proved to be a key moment that culminated in a deal, declared by Donald Trump, to release all captives still held.

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

This marks just the initial phase towards a more durable peace, and the specifics of Hamas disarmament, administering Gaza and complete Israeli pullout are still to be negotiated.

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

Trump's distinct approach and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Arab world seem to have played a role in this success.

However, as with many foreign policy wins, there were also elements involved beyond the control of either man.

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

In public, Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

The president often states that Israel has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has described Trump as the country's "most supportive friend in the White House". And these positive statements have been matched by actions.

Throughout his first presidential term, the president moved the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and abandoned a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the position under global norms.

After Israel began its air strikes against Iran in the summer, the US leader ordered US bombers to target the nation's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These public demonstrations of support may have given the president the room to apply more influence on Israel behind the scenes. According to reports, Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, pressured Netanyahu in late 2024 into agreeing to a halt in fighting in exchange for the release of some hostages.

After Israeli forces launched strikes against Syrian forces in July, even hitting a place of worship, Trump pressured Netanyahu to alter tactics.

The leader displayed a level of determination and pressure on an Israeli prime minister that is virtually unprecedented, says Aaron David Miller of the a think tank. "It's unheard of of an American president literally telling an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

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

His administration's "bear hug strategy" held that the US had to embrace Israel publicly in order to enable it to moderate the country's military actions behind closed doors.

Underneath this was the president's decades-long of backing for the state, as well as sharp divisions within his Democratic coalition over the conflict in Gaza. Each move the leader took risked fracturing his own domestic support, whereas Trump's solid Republican base gave him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

In the end, domestic politics or individual ties may have had little impact than the simple fact that, throughout Biden's presidency, the Israeli government was not ready to reach an agreement.

Eight months into Trump's second term, with Iran chastened, the militant group to its northern border significantly reduced and the coastal strip devastated, every one of its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Business History Helped Secure Support from Arab States

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, led the president to issue an final demand to Netanyahu. The war had to stop.

Trump had given the Israeli military a significant latitude in Gaza. The president lent American military might to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. But an attack on Qatari territory was a different matter entirely, pushing him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to conclude the conflict.

A number of administration figures have told the press that this was a decisive moment which galvanised the leader to apply maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

This US president's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are widely known. Trump has commercial interests with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. He began both his presidential terms with state visits to the kingdom. Recently, he also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

His Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between Israel and several Muslim states, such as the Emirates, was the biggest diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

His visits devoted in the capitals 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 he heard consistent appeals to put a stop to the conflict.

Within weeks after that attack on Doha, Trump sat close as Netanyahu himself called the Qatari leadership to express regret. Subsequently, the prime minister signed off on Trump's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that additionally had the backing of influential Arab states in the area.

If the president's relationship with his counterpart gave him the room to influence Israel to strike a deal, his past with Arab rulers 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 gained influence with the Israeli government, and through intermediaries with the militants," notes Jon Alterman of the a research center.

"This was crucial. The capacity to do this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the demands of the warring sides has been a problem that many previous presidents have struggled with, and he appears to handle with some success."

The fact that Trump is far better liked in Israel than the prime minister personally was an advantage that Trump used to his advantage, he adds.

Currently the Israeli government has agreed to releasing over a thousand detainees held in its jails and has agreed to a limited pullback from the strip.

The group will release all the captives still held, both alive and deceased, captured in the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which resulted in the loss of over 1,200 Israelis.

An end to the war, which has led to the destruction of the territory and the fatalities of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal