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Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas militant negotiating team in Doha appeared like another intensification that pushed the hope of peace out of reach.

The attack on 9 September breached the territorial integrity of an American ally and threatened widening the hostilities into a region-wide war.

Diplomacy appeared to be collapsing.

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

This is a objective that he, and President Joe Biden previously, had sought for nearly two years.

It is just the initial phase towards a lasting resolution, and the specifics of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be worked out.

Yet if this agreement holds, it could be Trump's signature achievement of his second term - one that escaped Joe Biden and his diplomatic team.

Trump's unique style and crucial relationships with Israel and the Arab world seem to have contributed in this breakthrough.

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

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

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

The president likes to say that the nation has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has described Trump as the country's "greatest ever ally in the White House". Moreover these positive statements have been backed up by deeds.

Throughout his first presidential term, Trump relocated the US embassy in the country from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and abandoned a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, the position under international law.

When the Israeli military began its bombing campaign against Iran in June, Trump 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 apply more influence on Israel in private. As per sources, Trump's negotiator, his representative, browbeat Netanyahu in late 2024 into agreeing to a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the freeing of some hostages.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in July, even bombing a Christian church, Trump pressured Netanyahu to change course.

Trump exhibited a level of will and pressure on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, according to Aaron David Miller of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "There is no example of an American president literally telling an Israeli leader that they must agree or else."

Joe Biden's relationship with the Israeli administration was consistently more strained.

The Biden team's "close embrace approach" argued that the United States had to embrace the nation openly in order to allow it to influence the nation's military actions behind closed doors.

Beneath this was Biden's decades-long of support for the state, as well as sharp divisions within his Democratic coalition over the conflict in Gaza. Every step Biden took endangered fracturing his own domestic support, while his successor's loyal conservative voters gave him more room to act.

In the end, domestic politics or personal relationships may have had little impact than the simple fact that, throughout Biden's presidency, the Israeli government was not ready to make peace.

Eight months into Trump's second term, with the Islamic Republic weakened, Hezbollah to its northern border significantly reduced and Gaza in ruins, all its key military goals had been achieved.

Business History Assisted Gain Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in the Qatari capital, which killed a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, prompted Trump to issue an final demand to the prime minister. The war had to end.

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

Several administration figures have told the press that this was a turning point which galvanised the president to exert maximum pressure to finalize an agreement.

The leader's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are well documented. Trump has business dealings with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. He began each of his administrations with official trips to Saudi Arabia. Recently, he also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

His normalization agreements, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and several Muslim states, such as the UAE, was the biggest foreign policy success of his first term.

The time he spent in the capitals of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months helped shift his perspective, says an expert of the a policy institute. Trump did not visit Israel on this regional tour but went to the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where the leader heard consistent appeals to put a stop to the conflict.

Less than a month after that attack on the city, the president was present nearby as the prime minister himself called Qatar 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 support of influential Arab states in the area.

Assuming Trump's alliance with Netanyahu provided him the room to pressure the government to reach an agreement, his past with Arab rulers may have secured their support, and helped them convince Hamas to agree to the arrangement.

"One of the things that clearly happened was that the US leader gained leverage with the Israeli government, and indirectly with the militants," notes an analyst of the a research center.

"That made a difference. His ability to achieve this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the demands of the warring sides has been a problem that lot of previous presidents have faced, and he seems to do with some success."

The fact that the president is far better liked in the nation than Netanyahu personally was an advantage that he employed to his benefit, he adds.

Now the Israeli government has committed to freeing over a thousand detainees imprisoned in Israeli prisons and has consented to a limited pullback from Gaza.

The group will release all the remaining hostages, living and dead, captured in the original 7 October Hamas attack, which resulted in the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

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