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Initially, Israel's air strike on the Hamas negotiating team in Qatar seemed like yet another intensification that pushed the prospect of peace further away.

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

Diplomacy seemed to be in ruins.

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

That represents a goal that he, and Joe Biden previously, had sought for nearly two years.

It is just the initial phase towards a more durable peace, and the specifics of Hamas disarmament, Gaza governance and complete Israeli pullout are still to be worked out.

But if this agreement stands, it could be Donald Trump's signature achievement of his second term - one that eluded Joe Biden and his diplomatic team.

Trump's unique style and crucial relationships with Israel and the Arab world seem to have played a role in this breakthrough.

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

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

In public, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

Trump likes to say that Israel has no better friend, and the Israeli leader has called him as the country's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". Moreover these positive statements have been backed up by actions.

During his first presidential term, Trump relocated the American diplomatic mission in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and discarded a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are against international law, the position under international law.

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

Those public demonstrations of support may have given the president the room to exert more influence on Israel in private. As per sources, the president's envoy, Steve Witkoff, browbeat the prime minister in late 2024 into agreeing to a halt in fighting in return for the freeing of some hostages.

When Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in July, even bombing a place of worship, the US president urged Netanyahu to alter tactics.

The leader exhibited a degree of will and pressure on an Israel's leader that is virtually unprecedented, according to Aaron David Miller of the a think tank. "It's unheard of of an American president literally telling an Israeli leader that you're going to have to comply or else."

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

The Biden team's "close embrace strategy" argued that the United States had to support Israel publicly in order to allow it to influence the nation's war conduct in private.

Underneath this was Biden's decades-long of support for the state, as well as sharp divisions within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Every step the leader took risked fracturing his own political backing, whereas his successor's loyal conservative voters gave him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, internal considerations or personal relationships may have had little impact than the reality that, during his term, Israel was unwilling to reach an agreement.

Several months into his new administration, with Iran chastened, Hezbollah to its northern border significantly reduced and Gaza in ruins, every one of its key military goals had been achieved.

Business History Assisted Secure Support from Arab States

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which killed a Qatari citizen but no Hamas officials, prompted the president to issue an ultimatum to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to stop.

The US leader had allowed Israel a relatively free hand in Gaza. He provided American military might to Israeli operations in Iran. However an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue entirely, moving him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to end the war.

A number of administration figures have informed the press that this was a decisive moment which motivated the leader to exert maximum pressure to finalize an agreement.

This US president's strong connections with the Gulf states are well documented. Trump has business dealings with the emirate and the United Arab Emirates. He began each of his administrations with state visits to the kingdom. Recently, Trump also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

His normalization agreements, which normalised relations between Israel and a number of Arab nations, including the UAE, was the biggest diplomatic achievement of his first term.

The time devoted in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months contributed to change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. The US president did not travel to Israel on this regional tour but visited the UAE, the kingdom and Qatar where he heard repeated calls to bring an end to the conflict.

Less than a month after that attack on the city, the president sat close as Netanyahu himself called Qatar to apologise. Subsequently, the prime minister signed off on the president's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that additionally had the support of influential Arab states in the region.

If the president's relationship with Netanyahu gave him the room to influence the government to reach an agreement, his past with Arab rulers may have ensured their backing, and helped them persuade the group to commit to the arrangement.

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

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

The fact that the president is far better liked in Israel than Netanyahu himself was an advantage that he used to his advantage, he adds.

Currently the Israeli government has agreed to freeing over a thousand Palestinians held in Israeli prisons and has consented to a partial withdrawal from Gaza.

The group will release all the captives still held, living and dead, taken in the initial October 7 assault, which resulted in the loss of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

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