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Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas militant delegation in Qatar appeared like yet another escalation that pushed the hope of a ceasefire further away.

The attack on September 9 breached the sovereignty of an American ally and threatened widening the conflict into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations seemed to be in ruins.

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

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

This marks just the first step towards a lasting resolution, and the specifics of Hamas disarmament, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be negotiated.

Yet if this agreement holds, it could be Donald Trump's defining accomplishment of his second term - one that eluded Biden and his diplomatic team.

The president's unique style and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Arab world seem to have contributed in this success.

But, as with most diplomatic achievements, there were also factors at play beyond the control of both leaders.

Strong Ties That Biden Never Had

Publicly, Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

The president likes to say that the nation has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has called Trump as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the White House". Moreover these warm words have been matched by deeds.

Throughout his initial time in office, Trump relocated the US embassy in Israel from its former location to the contested capital and abandoned a traditional American stance that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are against international law, the view under global norms.

After the Israeli military began its air strikes against Iran in June, Trump directed US bombers to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These visible shows of support may have given the president the room to exert more influence on Israel behind the scenes. According to reports, Trump's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, browbeat Netanyahu in the latter part of the year into agreeing to a halt in fighting in return for the release of some hostages.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in the summer, even bombing a Christian church, Trump urged his counterpart to alter tactics.

The leader exhibited a level of will and pressure on an Israel's leader that is virtually unprecedented, says an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "There is no example of an US leader directly instructing an Israeli leader that they must agree or else."

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

His administration's "close embrace approach" held that the US had to embrace the nation publicly in order to enable it to moderate the country's war conduct in private.

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

Ultimately, domestic politics or personal relationships may have had little impact than the reality that, throughout his term, the Israeli government 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, all its key military goals had been achieved.

Commercial Background Helped Gain Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but no Hamas officials, led the president to issue an ultimatum to Netanyahu. The war had to stop.

Trump had allowed the Israeli military a significant latitude in Gaza. He provided American military might to Israeli operations in Iran. However an attack on Qatar soil was a different matter entirely, moving him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to end the war.

A number of Trump officials have told media outlets that this was a decisive moment which motivated the leader to apply full force to finalize an agreement.

This US president's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are widely known. Trump has commercial interests with Qatar and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, he also visited in Doha and the UAE capital.

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

His visits devoted in the cities of the Gulf region in recent months contributed to change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. Trump did not visit the country on this Middle East trip but went to the UAE, the kingdom and Qatar where the leader received consistent appeals to put a stop to the war.

Within weeks after that attack on the city, the president sat close as Netanyahu himself called Qatar to express regret. Subsequently, the prime minister gave approval on the president's 20-point peace plan for the territory - one that additionally had the backing of influential Arab states in the region.

If the president's alliance with his counterpart gave him the room to influence Israel to strike a deal, his history with Muslim leaders may have ensured their backing, and helped them persuade the group to commit to the deal.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that President Trump developed influence with the Israelis, and through intermediaries with the militants," says an analyst of the a research center.

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

The reality that Trump is much more popular in the nation than Netanyahu personally was an advantage that he used to his advantage, the expert continues.

Currently the Israeli government has committed to releasing over a thousand detainees held in its jails and has agreed to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

The group will free all the captives still held, living and dead, taken during the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which caused the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

A conclusion to the conflict, which has led to the destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal