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Initially, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas militant delegation in Qatar appeared like another intensification that pushed the hope of peace further away.

This strike on September 9 violated the territorial integrity of an American ally and threatened widening the hostilities into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations seemed to be collapsing.

Instead, it turned out to be a key moment that culminated in a agreement, declared by President Donald Trump, to release all captives still held.

That represents a goal that he, and Joe Biden before him, had pursued for nearly two years.

It is just the initial phase towards a more durable peace, and the specifics of Hamas disarmament, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be negotiated.

But if this agreement stands, it could be Trump's defining accomplishment of his return to office - one that escaped Biden and his administration.

The president's distinct approach and crucial relationships with Israel and the Arab world appear to have contributed in this success.

But, as with most foreign policy wins, there were also elements at play beyond the control of both leaders.

A Close Relationship That Eluded Biden

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

Trump often states that Israel has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has described him as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the White House". And these warm words have been backed up by actions.

Throughout his initial time in office, the president relocated the American diplomatic mission in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and abandoned a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, the view under global norms.

When Israel began its air strikes against the Islamic Republic in June, the US leader directed US bombers to target the Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those public demonstrations of support may have given the president the room to exert more influence on Israel in private. As per sources, the president's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, pressured Netanyahu in the latter part of the year into agreeing to a temporary ceasefire in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

After Israel launched strikes against Syrian forces in the summer, even hitting a Christian church, Trump urged his counterpart to alter tactics.

The leader displayed a degree of determination and insistence on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, according to Aaron David Miller of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "It's unheard of of an US leader literally telling an Israeli prime minister that they must agree or else."

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

The Biden team's "close embrace approach" argued that the US had to support the nation publicly in order to allow it to moderate the nation's military actions in private.

Underneath this was the president's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the conflict in Gaza. Each move the leader took risked fracturing his own domestic support, whereas his successor's loyal conservative voters provided him more flexibility to act.

In the end, internal considerations or individual ties may have had little impact than the simple fact that, during Biden's presidency, Israel was unwilling to make peace.

Eight months into his new administration, with Iran chastened, the militant group to its northern border greatly diminished and the coastal strip in ruins, all its key military goals had been achieved.

Commercial Background Assisted Secure Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a local national but no Hamas officials, prompted Trump to deliver an final demand to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

Trump had given the Israeli military a relatively free hand in Gaza. He lent American military might to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. However an strike on Qatari territory was a different matter completely, pushing him closer to the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

A number of Trump officials have informed media outlets that this was a turning point which galvanised the leader to exert maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

This US president's strong connections with the Gulf states are widely known. Trump has commercial interests with Qatar and the UAE. The president began both his presidential terms with official trips to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also stopped in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

The president's Abraham Accords, which established ties between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, such as the Emirates, was the biggest foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

The time devoted in the cities of the Gulf region in recent months contributed to shift his perspective, says an expert of the a policy institute. The US president did not travel to Israel on this Middle East trip but went to the United Arab Emirates, the kingdom and the state where the leader heard repeated calls to put a stop to the war.

Less than a month after that attack on the city, Trump was present nearby as Netanyahu himself phoned the Qatari leadership to express regret. And later that day, the Israeli leader gave approval on Trump's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the backing of key Muslim nations in the area.

If the president's alliance with Netanyahu gave him the ability to pressure Israel to reach an agreement, his history with Muslim leaders may have secured their backing, and helped them persuade the group to agree to the deal.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that President Trump developed influence with the Israeli government, 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 not succumb to the demands of the combatants has been a problem that many previous presidents have faced, and he appears to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister himself was leverage that Trump used to his benefit, he adds.

Currently the Israeli government has agreed to releasing more than 1,000 detainees imprisoned in Israeli prisons and has consented to a limited pullback from Gaza.

The group will release all the captives still held, both alive and deceased, captured during the initial October 7 assault, 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 deaths of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal