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Initially, Israel's air strike on the Hamas delegation in Doha seemed like yet another intensification that drove the prospect of a ceasefire out of reach.

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

Negotiations appeared to be collapsing.

However, it proved to be a pivotal event that culminated in a agreement, announced by President Donald Trump, to free all remaining hostages.

That represents a goal that Trump, and Joe Biden previously, had sought for almost 24 months.

This marks just the first step towards a lasting resolution, and the specifics of disarming Hamas, administering Gaza and complete Israeli pullout remain to be negotiated.

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

Trump's distinct approach and key alliances with Israel and the Middle Eastern nations seem to have contributed in this breakthrough.

But, as with most diplomatic achievements, there were also elements at play beyond the influence of both leaders.

Strong Ties That Eluded Biden

Publicly, Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

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

Throughout his initial time in office, the president relocated the US embassy in the country from its former location to the contested capital and discarded a traditional American stance that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the position under international law.

After the Israeli military began its air strikes against Iran in the summer, Trump directed US bombers to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

These visible shows of backing may have allowed the president the leeway to apply more influence on Israel in private. According to reports, Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, pressured the prime minister in late 2024 into accepting a temporary ceasefire in return for the release of some hostages.

After Israeli forces launched strikes against Syria's military in the summer, even hitting a place of worship, the US president urged his counterpart to alter tactics.

The leader displayed a level of determination and pressure on an Israel's leader that is rarely seen, 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 connection with the Israeli administration was always more strained.

The Biden team's "bear hug approach" argued that the United States had to embrace Israel openly in order to enable it to moderate the country's war conduct in private.

Beneath this was the president's decades-long of support for the state, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Each move Biden took endangered fracturing his own domestic support, whereas his successor's solid Republican base provided him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, internal considerations or personal relationships may have had less importance than the simple fact that, throughout Biden's presidency, Israel was unwilling to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic chastened, Hezbollah to its northern border significantly reduced and Gaza devastated, every one of its key military goals had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Helped Secure Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which killed a local national but not the intended targets, prompted the president to issue an final demand to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to stop.

The US leader had allowed the Israeli military a relatively free hand in the territory. The president lent US armed support to Israeli operations in Iran. However an strike on Qatari territory was a different matter entirely, moving him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to end the war.

A number of Trump officials have told the press that this was a turning point which galvanised the leader to exert maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

The leader's strong connections with the Gulf states are well documented. He has business dealings with the emirate and the UAE. The president began each of his administrations with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, he also visited in Doha and the UAE capital.

His Abraham Accords, which established ties between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, including the Emirates, was the most significant foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

His visits devoted in the cities of the Gulf region earlier this year helped change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. The US president did not travel to 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 conflict.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on the city, Trump sat close as Netanyahu himself phoned Qatar to apologise. And later that day, the prime minister gave approval on Trump's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the support of key Muslim nations in the area.

If the president's alliance with Netanyahu gave him the ability to pressure the government to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have secured their backing, and assisted them convince Hamas to agree to the deal.

"A key factor that clearly happened 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 achieve this on his own schedule, and not succumb to the desires of the warring sides has been a problem that lot of previous presidents have struggled with, and Trump appears to handle with some success."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister himself was leverage that he employed to his advantage, he adds.

Now the Israeli government has agreed to freeing more than 1,000 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons and has consented to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

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

A conclusion to the conflict, which has resulted in the devastation of Gaza and the fatalities of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal