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At first, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas militant negotiating team in Qatar seemed like yet another intensification that pushed the prospect of peace further away.

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

Negotiations appeared to be in ruins.

Instead, it turned out to be a pivotal event that has led in a agreement, announced by President Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

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

This marks just the first step towards a more durable peace, and the details of Hamas disarmament, Gaza governance and complete Israeli pullout are still to be worked out.

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

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

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

A Close Relationship That Biden Never Had

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

Trump often states that the nation has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has described Trump as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". Moreover these warm words have been matched by actions.

Throughout his initial time in office, Trump relocated the American diplomatic mission in the country from its former location to Jerusalem and abandoned a long-held US position that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, the view under global norms.

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

These visible shows of backing may have allowed the president the leeway to exert more pressure on the Israeli government in private. According to reports, the president's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, browbeat Netanyahu in the latter part of the year into agreeing to a temporary ceasefire in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

After Israel launched strikes against Syrian forces in July, including hitting a place of worship, Trump urged his counterpart to change course.

The leader exhibited a level of will and pressure on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, according to an analyst of the a think tank. "It's unheard of of an American president directly instructing an Israeli leader that you're going to have to comply or else."

Joe Biden's connection with the Israeli administration was always more strained.

His administration's "close embrace strategy" argued that the US had to embrace the nation publicly in order to allow it to moderate the nation's war conduct in private.

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

In the end, internal considerations or individual ties may have had little impact than the simple fact that, throughout his term, Israel was not ready to make peace.

Eight months into Trump's second term, with Iran chastened, Hezbollah to its immediate north significantly reduced and the coastal strip in ruins, all its major strategy objectives had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Helped Gain Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in Doha, which resulted in the death of a local national but no Hamas officials, prompted Trump to issue an final demand to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to stop.

Trump had given the Israeli military a significant latitude in the territory. The president provided American military might to Israeli operations in Iran. However an attack on Qatari territory was a different matter entirely, moving him closer to 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 president to apply maximum pressure to finalize an agreement.

This US president's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are well documented. Trump has business dealings with the emirate and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, he also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

His normalization agreements, which normalised relations between Israel and a number of Arab nations, such as the Emirates, was the biggest foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

The time he spent in the cities of the Gulf region in recent months contributed to change his thinking, says an expert of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not travel to Israel on this regional tour but went to the UAE, Saudi Arabia and the state where he heard repeated calls to put a stop to the conflict.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on the city, the president sat nearby as Netanyahu personally called the Qatari leadership to express regret. And later that day, the prime minister gave approval on the president's 20-point peace plan for the territory - one that additionally had the support of influential Arab states in the area.

If the president's relationship with Netanyahu provided him the room to influence Israel to reach an agreement, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their backing, and helped them persuade Hamas to commit to the deal.

"One of the things that clearly happened was that President Trump gained influence with the Israeli government, and indirectly with Hamas," notes an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. His ability to do this on his timing, and not succumb to the desires of the combatants has been a problem that lot of earlier administrations have struggled with, and he seems to do relatively successfully."

The fact that the president is much more popular in Israel than Netanyahu personally was an advantage that Trump used to his advantage, the expert continues.

Currently Israel has committed to freeing more than 1,000 detainees 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, captured during the initial October 7 assault, which caused the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

An end to the war, which has led to the devastation of the territory and the deaths of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal