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Initially, the Israeli air strike on the Hamas delegation in Doha seemed like yet another escalation that pushed the hope of peace out of reach.

The attack on 9 September violated the territorial integrity of an US partner and threatened widening the hostilities into a region-wide war.

Diplomacy seemed to be collapsing.

However, it proved to be a key moment that has led in a agreement, declared by Donald Trump, to release all captives still held.

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

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

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

Trump's unique style and key alliances with Israel and the Middle Eastern nations appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

But, as with most foreign policy wins, there were also elements involved beyond the control of either man.

A Close Relationship Which Biden Never Had

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

Trump likes to say that Israel has no better friend, and Netanyahu has called him as the country's "most supportive friend in the White House". Moreover these positive statements have been matched by actions.

During his initial time in office, Trump relocated the US embassy in the country from its former location to Jerusalem and abandoned a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are against international law, the view under global norms.

When the Israeli military began its air strikes against the Islamic Republic in the summer, Trump ordered American aircraft to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

These public demonstrations of support may have given Trump the leeway to exert more influence on Israel in private. According to reports, Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, browbeat Netanyahu in the latter part of the year into accepting a halt in fighting in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syria's military in July, even bombing a Christian church, Trump urged Netanyahu to change course.

Trump displayed a level of will and pressure on an Israel's leader that is virtually unprecedented, according to an analyst of the a think tank. "It's unheard of of an American president literally telling an Israeli leader that they must agree or else."

Joe Biden's connection with Netanyahu's government was always more strained.

His administration's "bear hug strategy" argued that the US had to support the nation publicly in order to enable it to influence the nation's war conduct in private.

Beneath this was the president's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as sharp divisions within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Every step Biden took risked dividing his own domestic support, while Trump's solid Republican base provided him more room to manoeuvre.

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

Eight months into Trump's second term, with Iran weakened, the militant group to its northern border greatly diminished and the coastal strip in ruins, every one of its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Business History Assisted Secure Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in Doha, which resulted in the death of a local national but not the intended targets, prompted the president to issue an ultimatum to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

Trump had allowed the Israeli military a relatively free hand in the territory. He lent American military might to Israeli operations in Iran. However an strike on Qatar soil was a different matter entirely, pushing him towards the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several Trump officials have told media outlets that this was a decisive moment which motivated the leader to apply maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

This US president's close ties with the Gulf states are widely known. He has commercial interests with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. He began both his presidential terms with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

The president's normalization agreements, which established ties between Israel and several Muslim states, such as the Emirates, was the biggest foreign policy success of his first term.

His visits he spent in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months contributed to shift his perspective, according to an expert of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not visit Israel on this Middle East trip but visited the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where he heard consistent appeals to bring an end to the war.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on the city, the president sat close as Netanyahu himself called Qatar to express regret. Subsequently, the Israeli leader signed off on the president's comprehensive proposal for the territory - one that additionally had the backing of influential Arab states in the region.

Assuming the president's relationship with his counterpart provided him the ability to pressure Israel to strike a deal, his history with Muslim leaders may have secured their support, and helped them convince Hamas to commit to the arrangement.

"One of the things that clearly happened was that President Trump developed leverage with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," says Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. The capacity to do this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a challenge that many previous presidents have faced, and he appears to do with some success."

The fact that the president is far better liked in the nation than Netanyahu personally was leverage that Trump used to his advantage, the expert continues.

Now the Israeli government has agreed to freeing over a thousand detainees held in its jails and has consented to a partial withdrawal from Gaza.

The group will free all the remaining hostages, living and dead, taken in the original 7 October assault, which resulted in the loss of over 1,200 Israelis.

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