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At first, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas militant delegation in Doha seemed like another escalation that drove the hope of peace out of reach.

This strike on September 9 violated the territorial integrity of an US partner and risked widening the conflict into a region-wide war.

Diplomacy seemed to be in ruins.

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

This is a objective that he, and President Joe Biden previously, had pursued for almost 24 months.

This marks just the initial phase towards a lasting resolution, and the details of disarming Hamas, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal are still to be negotiated.

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

Trump's distinct approach and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Middle Eastern nations appear to have played a role in this success.

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

Strong Ties That Eluded Biden

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

The president often states that the nation has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has called Trump as the country's "most supportive friend in the White House". And these warm words have been backed up by actions.

Throughout his first presidential term, Trump relocated the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and abandoned a traditional American stance that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are against international law, the position under international law.

When Israel began its bombing campaign against Iran in the summer, the US leader ordered American aircraft to target the Iran's atomic sites with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those visible shows of backing may have given Trump the leeway to exert more pressure on Israel behind the scenes. As per sources, the president's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, pressured the prime minister in late 2024 into accepting a temporary ceasefire in return for the release of a number of captives.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syria's military in July, even hitting a place of worship, Trump urged his counterpart to alter tactics.

The leader exhibited a degree of determination and pressure on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, says Aaron David Miller of the a think tank. "There is no example 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 the Israeli administration was consistently more strained.

The Biden team's "bear hug approach" argued that the United States had to embrace the nation publicly in order to allow it to moderate the nation's military actions 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 dividing his own domestic support, whereas his successor's loyal conservative voters gave him more room to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, domestic politics or individual ties may have had less importance than the reality that, throughout his term, the Israeli government was unwilling to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with Iran chastened, the militant group to its immediate north greatly diminished and Gaza in ruins, every one of its key military goals had been achieved.

Commercial Background Assisted Gain Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a local national but no Hamas officials, led the president to issue an ultimatum to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to end.

The US leader had given Israel a significant latitude in the territory. The president lent American military might to Israeli operations in Iran. But an strike on Qatar soil was a separate issue entirely, pushing him towards the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several Trump officials have told the press that this was a turning point which galvanised the leader to exert full force to get a peace deal done.

This US president's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are well documented. Trump has business dealings with the emirate and the United Arab Emirates. The president began both his presidential terms with official trips to the kingdom. Recently, Trump also stopped 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 diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

The time he spent in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula earlier this year helped change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. The US president did not travel to the country on this Middle East trip but visited the United Arab Emirates, the kingdom and the state where he received repeated calls to bring an end to the war.

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

If the president's relationship with his counterpart provided him the room to pressure Israel to strike a deal, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their backing, and assisted them convince the group to commit to the arrangement.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that the US leader gained influence with the Israeli government, and indirectly with the militants," says an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. The capacity to do this on his own schedule, and not succumb to the desires of the combatants has been a challenge that many previous presidents have faced, and he seems to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in the nation than Netanyahu personally was an advantage that Trump employed to his benefit, he adds.

Now the Israeli government has committed to freeing over a thousand Palestinians held in its jails and has consented to a limited pullback from Gaza.

The group will release all the captives still held, both alive and deceased, captured during 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 destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal