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Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas militant delegation in Doha appeared like another intensification that pushed the prospect of a ceasefire out of reach.

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

Negotiations seemed to be in ruins.

Instead, it proved to be a key moment that culminated in a deal, announced by President Donald Trump, to free all remaining hostages.

That represents a goal that Trump, and President Joe Biden previously, had pursued for nearly two years.

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

But if this agreement stands, it could be Donald Trump's defining accomplishment of his second term - one that eluded Joe Biden and his administration.

Trump's distinct approach and crucial relationships with the Israeli government and the Middle Eastern nations seem to have played a role in this success.

However, as with many diplomatic achievements, there were also factors involved beyond the influence of both leaders.

Strong Ties That Biden Never Had

Publicly, Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

The president likes to say that Israel has no better friend, and the Israeli leader has described him as Israel's "most supportive friend in the US presidency". Moreover these positive statements have been backed up by actions.

During his first presidential term, Trump relocated the US embassy in the country from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and abandoned a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, the position under global norms.

When Israel began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in the summer, Trump ordered American aircraft to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

These public demonstrations of support may have allowed Trump the leeway to exert more influence on Israel in private. According to reports, Trump's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, browbeat the prime minister in the latter part of the year into accepting a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the release of some hostages.

When Israel launched strikes against Syrian forces in the summer, including bombing a Christian church, the US president urged Netanyahu to change course.

The leader exhibited a degree 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 directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

Joe Biden's connection with Netanyahu's government was always more strained.

His administration's "close embrace approach" held that the United States had to support the nation openly in order to enable it to moderate the country's war conduct behind closed doors.

Beneath this was Biden's decades-long of backing for the state, as well as sharp divisions within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Each move the leader took endangered dividing his own political backing, whereas Trump's solid Republican base gave him more room to manoeuvre.

In the end, internal considerations or individual ties may have had little impact than the simple fact that, throughout his term, the Israeli government was unwilling to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with Iran chastened, Hezbollah to its immediate north significantly reduced and the coastal strip in ruins, all its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Business History Helped Gain Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, led Trump to deliver an ultimatum to the prime minister. The war had to end.

The US leader had given the Israeli military a relatively free hand in Gaza. The president provided US armed support to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. However an strike on Qatar soil was a different matter entirely, moving him towards the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several administration figures have told media outlets that this was a turning point which motivated the leader to apply maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

This US president's close ties with the Gulf states are well documented. He has business dealings with Qatar and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with official trips to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also visited in Qatar and Abu Dhabi.

His Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between Israel and a number of Arab nations, such as the Emirates, was the most significant foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

His visits devoted in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months contributed to change his thinking, says an expert of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not travel to the country on this Middle East trip but visited the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where he received repeated calls to bring an end to the war.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on Doha, the president sat close as the prime minister himself called the Qatari leadership to express regret. And later that day, the prime minister signed off on the president's 20-point peace plan for Gaza - one that also had the backing of influential Arab states in the region.

Assuming the president's alliance with his counterpart provided him the room to influence Israel to strike a deal, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their support, and assisted them convince Hamas to agree to the deal.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that the US leader developed leverage with the Israeli government, and through intermediaries with Hamas," says Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. His ability to do this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a problem that many previous presidents have faced, and Trump seems to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister personally was leverage that Trump employed to his benefit, the expert continues.

Now the Israeli government has committed to freeing more than 1,000 detainees held in its jails and has agreed to a partial withdrawal from Gaza.

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

A conclusion to the conflict, which has led to the devastation of the territory and the fatalities of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal