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At first, Israel's air strike on the Hamas delegation in Doha appeared like yet another intensification that drove the hope of peace further away.

This strike on September 9 breached the territorial integrity of an US partner and risked expanding the hostilities into a broader regional conflict.

Diplomacy seemed to be in ruins.

However, it proved to be a pivotal event that has led in a agreement, declared by Donald Trump, to release all remaining hostages.

This is a objective that he, and Joe Biden previously, had pursued for nearly two years.

This marks just the initial phase towards a more durable peace, and the details of Hamas disarmament, Gaza governance and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be negotiated.

Yet if this agreement holds, it could be Trump's defining accomplishment of his return to office - one that eluded Joe Biden and his diplomatic team.

The president's unique style and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Arab world appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

However, as with many foreign policy wins, there were also elements at play beyond the influence of either man.

A Close Relationship That Biden Never Had

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

Trump often states that the nation has no better friend, and the Israeli leader has described him as the country's "most supportive friend in the White House". Moreover these warm words have been matched by actions.

During his initial time in office, Trump relocated the US embassy in the country from its former location to the contested capital and discarded a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are against international law, the position under international law.

After Israel began its air strikes against the Islamic Republic in the summer, Trump directed American aircraft to target the nation's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These public demonstrations of support may have allowed the president the room to exert more pressure on Israel behind the scenes. According to reports, Trump's negotiator, his representative, 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 Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in July, including hitting a place of worship, the US president pressured his counterpart to alter tactics.

Trump displayed a level of will and insistence on an Israel's leader 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 connection with Netanyahu's government was consistently more tenuous.

His administration's "close embrace approach" held that the United States had to embrace the nation publicly in order to enable it to influence the nation's war conduct in private.

Beneath this was the president's decades-long of backing for the state, as well as sharp divisions within his political base over the conflict in Gaza. Every step the leader took risked fracturing his own political backing, whereas Trump's solid Republican base provided him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, internal considerations or individual ties may have had little impact than the reality that, during his term, the Israeli government was unwilling to reach an agreement.

Several months into Trump's second term, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its immediate north significantly reduced and the coastal strip in ruins, all its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Commercial Background Helped Gain Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but no Hamas officials, prompted the president to deliver an final demand to Netanyahu. The war had to stop.

Trump had given Israel a significant latitude in the territory. He lent US armed support to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. But an strike on Qatar soil was a different matter completely, pushing him towards the Arab position on how best to end the war.

A number of Trump officials have informed media outlets that this was a decisive moment which galvanised the leader to apply full force to get a peace deal done.

This US president's close ties with the Arab monarchies are well documented. He has business dealings with the emirate and the United Arab Emirates. The president began both his presidential terms with state visits to the kingdom. Recently, he 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.

His visits devoted in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula earlier this year helped shift his perspective, according to Ed Husain of the a policy institute. The US president did not visit Israel on this Middle East trip but went to the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where the leader received repeated calls to bring an end to the conflict.

Within weeks after that attack on the city, Trump sat nearby as the prime minister personally phoned Qatar to apologise. Subsequently, the Israeli leader signed off on the president's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the backing of key Muslim nations in the area.

Assuming Trump's alliance with Netanyahu provided him the ability to pressure Israel to strike a deal, his past with Arab rulers may have ensured their backing, and assisted them persuade the group to agree to the arrangement.

"A key factor that clearly happened was that the US leader developed influence with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," notes Jon Alterman of the a research center.

"That made a difference. The capacity to do this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the demands of the combatants has been a challenge that lot of previous presidents have faced, and Trump appears to handle with some success."

The fact that the president is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister personally was leverage that he used to his advantage, the expert continues.

Now Israel has agreed to releasing over a thousand detainees held in its jails and has agreed to a partial withdrawal from Gaza.

Hamas will release all the remaining hostages, both alive and deceased, taken in the original 7 October assault, which caused the death of over 1,200 Israelis.

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