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At first, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas negotiating team in Qatar appeared like another escalation that pushed the prospect of a ceasefire further away.

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

Diplomacy seemed to be in ruins.

However, it turned out to be a key moment that has led in a agreement, declared by Donald Trump, to free all remaining hostages.

That represents a objective that Trump, and President Joe Biden before him, had sought for almost 24 months.

It is just the first step towards a more durable peace, and the specifics of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and complete Israeli pullout remain to be negotiated.

Yet if this deal stands, it could be Donald Trump's signature achievement of his return to office - one that escaped Biden and his administration.

The president's unique style and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Middle Eastern nations appear to have played a role in this success.

But, as with most foreign policy wins, there were also factors at play beyond the influence of both leaders.

Strong Ties Which Biden Never Had

In public, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

Trump often states that Israel has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has called him as Israel's "most supportive friend in the US presidency". Moreover these warm words have been matched by deeds.

During his initial time in office, Trump moved the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and discarded a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are against international law, the position under global norms.

When the Israeli military began its air strikes against Iran in the summer, Trump ordered American aircraft to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those visible shows of support may have given the president the leeway to exert more pressure on the Israeli government in private. According to reports, Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, pressured Netanyahu in late 2024 into accepting a temporary ceasefire in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

When Israeli forces launched strikes against Syrian forces in July, even bombing a place of worship, the US president urged his counterpart to change course.

The leader exhibited a degree of determination and pressure on an Israel's leader that is virtually unprecedented, according to an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "There is no example of an US leader directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

Biden's relationship with Netanyahu's government was consistently more strained.

The Biden team's "close embrace approach" argued that the US had to support the nation openly in order to enable it to moderate the nation's war conduct in private.

Underneath this was Biden's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his political base over the Gaza War. Every step the leader took risked fracturing his own domestic support, while Trump's solid Republican base gave him more room to act.

In the end, domestic politics or individual ties may have had little impact than the reality that, throughout his term, Israel was not ready to reach an agreement.

Eight months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its northern border greatly diminished and Gaza in ruins, every one of its key military goals had been achieved.

Commercial Background Helped Secure Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in Doha, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but no Hamas officials, prompted Trump to deliver an ultimatum to the prime minister. Hostilities had to end.

Trump had allowed the Israeli military a relatively free hand in the territory. The president lent American military might to Israel's campaign in Iran. However an attack on Qatar soil was a different matter completely, moving 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 turning point which galvanised the leader to exert full force to finalize an agreement.

This US president's close ties with the Gulf states are well documented. He has commercial interests with the emirate and the UAE. The president began each of his administrations with official trips to the kingdom. Recently, Trump also stopped in Doha and the UAE capital.

The president's Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and several Muslim states, such as the UAE, was the biggest diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

His visits he spent in the capitals of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months contributed to shift his perspective, according to Ed Husain of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not travel to the country on this regional tour but visited the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and the state where the leader received consistent appeals to bring an end to the war.

Within weeks after that attack on the city, the president was present close as the prime minister himself called the Qatari leadership to apologise. Subsequently, the Israeli leader gave approval on Trump's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the support of key Muslim nations in the area.

If Trump's relationship with Netanyahu provided him the ability to pressure the government to strike a deal, his past with Muslim leaders may have ensured their backing, and assisted them convince the group to agree to the deal.

"A key factor that clearly happened was that the US leader gained influence with the Israelis, and through intermediaries with Hamas," says an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. The capacity to achieve this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a problem that lot of earlier administrations have struggled with, and he seems to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that Trump is far better liked in the nation than Netanyahu himself was an advantage that Trump employed to his benefit, the expert continues.

Now the Israeli government has committed to freeing more than 1,000 detainees held in Israeli prisons and has agreed to a limited pullback from Gaza.

Hamas will release all the remaining hostages, both alive and deceased, taken during the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which caused the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

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