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At first, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas militant delegation in Doha appeared like yet another intensification that drove the hope of a ceasefire further away.

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

Negotiations seemed to be in ruins.

However, it proved to be a pivotal event that has led in a deal, declared by President Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

That represents a goal that he, and President Joe Biden previously, had sought for almost 24 months.

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

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

The president's distinct approach and key alliances with Israel and the Arab world seem to have contributed in this success.

But, as with most diplomatic achievements, there were also factors involved beyond the influence of either man.

A Close Relationship Which Biden Never Had

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

Trump often states that Israel has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has described Trump as the country's "most supportive friend in the US presidency". And these positive statements have been matched by deeds.

During his first presidential term, the president moved the American diplomatic mission in Israel from its former location to Jerusalem and discarded a long-held US position 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 strike the Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

These public demonstrations of support may have given the president the room to exert more pressure on the Israeli government behind the scenes. As per sources, Trump's envoy, his representative, browbeat the prime minister in the latter part of the year into accepting a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the release of a number of captives.

After Israel attacked against Syria's military in July, even bombing a place of worship, the US president pressured his counterpart to alter tactics.

The leader displayed a level of will and pressure on an Israel's leader that is virtually unprecedented, says Aaron David Miller of the a think tank. "It's unheard of of an US leader literally telling an Israeli leader that they must agree or else."

Joe Biden's relationship with Netanyahu's government was consistently more tenuous.

His administration's "close embrace strategy" held that the United States had to support Israel publicly in order to enable it to influence the nation's military actions in private.

Beneath this was the president's nearly half-century of backing for the state, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Each move the leader took endangered dividing his own political backing, whereas Trump's solid Republican base provided him more room to act.

In the end, domestic politics or individual ties may have had less importance than the reality that, throughout his term, the Israeli government was not ready to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its immediate north greatly diminished and the coastal strip devastated, every one of its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Business History Helped Gain Support from Arab States

An Israeli strike in Doha, which killed a local national but not the intended targets, prompted the president to issue an final demand to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to stop.

The US leader had given the Israeli military a relatively free hand in the territory. He provided American military might to Israeli operations in Iran. However an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue completely, pushing 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 full force to finalize an agreement.

The leader's close ties with the Arab monarchies are widely known. Trump has business dealings with Qatar and the UAE. The president began both his presidential terms with state visits to the kingdom. Recently, he also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

His Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between Israel and a number of Arab nations, including the UAE, was the biggest foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

His visits he spent in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula earlier this year helped change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. Trump did not travel to Israel on this regional tour but visited the UAE, the kingdom and Qatar where he heard repeated calls to put a stop to the war.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on Doha, Trump was present nearby as Netanyahu himself phoned Qatar to apologise. Subsequently, the Israeli leader gave approval on Trump's comprehensive proposal for the territory - one that additionally had the backing of influential Arab states in the area.

If Trump's alliance with his counterpart gave him the ability to pressure Israel to strike a deal, his past with Arab rulers may have ensured their backing, and helped them persuade the group to agree to the deal.

"One of the things that clearly happened was that President Trump gained influence with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," notes an analyst of the a research center.

"This was crucial. His ability to do this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a problem that many previous presidents have struggled with, and Trump appears to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that the president is far better liked in the nation than the prime minister himself was an advantage that Trump used to his benefit, the expert continues.

Now the Israeli government has committed to releasing more than 1,000 detainees held in its jails and has consented to a limited pullback from Gaza.

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

An end to the war, which has resulted in the destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal