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Initially, the Israeli air strike on the Hamas delegation in Qatar seemed like another escalation that pushed the prospect of a ceasefire out of reach.

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

Negotiations seemed to be collapsing.

Instead, it proved to be a pivotal event that culminated in a agreement, declared by President Donald Trump, to release all remaining hostages.

That represents a objective that Trump, and Joe Biden before him, had sought for nearly two years.

This marks just the first step towards a more durable peace, and the details of disarming Hamas, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be negotiated.

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

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 breakthrough.

However, as with many diplomatic achievements, there were also elements at play beyond the control of either man.

Strong Ties That Biden Never Had

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

The president likes to say that Israel has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has described him as the country's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". And these warm words have been backed up by deeds.

During his initial time in office, the president relocated the US embassy in Israel from its former location to the contested capital and discarded a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the view under global norms.

When the Israeli military began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in June, the US leader ordered US bombers to strike the Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those public demonstrations of support may have allowed the president the leeway to exert more pressure on Israel in private. As per sources, the president's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, browbeat the prime minister in the latter part of the year into agreeing to a halt in fighting in return for the release of some hostages.

When Israeli forces launched strikes against Syria's military in July, even bombing a Christian church, the US president pressured his counterpart to alter tactics.

The leader displayed a level of will and insistence on an Israeli prime minister that is virtually unprecedented, says an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "There is no example of an American president directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that they must agree or else."

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

His administration's "bear hug strategy" argued that the US had to support the nation openly in order to enable it to influence the country's war conduct behind closed doors.

Underneath this was Biden's nearly half-century of support for the state, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Each move Biden took risked fracturing his own political backing, while his successor's loyal conservative voters provided him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, domestic politics or personal relationships may have had less importance than the simple fact that, throughout Biden's presidency, Israel was not ready to reach an agreement.

Eight months into his new administration, with Iran chastened, the militant group to its immediate north significantly reduced and the coastal strip in ruins, all its key military goals had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Assisted Gain Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, prompted Trump to issue an ultimatum to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

Trump had allowed the Israeli military a significant latitude in the territory. He provided US armed support to Israeli operations in Iran. But an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue entirely, moving him closer to the Arab position on how best to end the war.

Several Trump officials have told the press that this was a turning point which motivated the president to apply full force to get a peace deal done.

The leader's close ties with the Arab monarchies are well documented. He has commercial interests with Qatar and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with official trips to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also visited in Doha and the UAE capital.

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

His visits devoted in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula earlier this year contributed to shift his perspective, says Ed Husain of the a policy institute. The US president did not visit Israel on this Middle East trip but went to the UAE, the kingdom and the state where he received consistent appeals to bring an end to the war.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on Doha, Trump sat close as the prime minister personally phoned the Qatari leadership to apologise. Subsequently, the Israeli leader signed off on the president's comprehensive proposal for the territory - one that also had the backing of key Muslim nations in the area.

If Trump's alliance with his counterpart gave him the ability to pressure the government to strike a deal, his history with Muslim leaders may have ensured their backing, and helped them convince Hamas to commit to the deal.

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

"This was crucial. His ability to do this on his own schedule, and not succumb to the desires of the warring sides has been a problem that many earlier administrations have struggled with, and he appears to handle with some success."

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

Currently Israel has committed to releasing more than 1,000 detainees imprisoned in Israeli prisons and has agreed to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

The group will release all the captives still held, both alive and deceased, captured during the original 7 October assault, which caused the death of over 1,200 Israelis.

A conclusion to the conflict, which has resulted in the devastation of Gaza and the fatalities of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal