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Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas militant delegation in Qatar appeared like yet another intensification that drove the prospect of a ceasefire out of reach.

The attack on September 9 breached the territorial integrity of an US partner and threatened widening the conflict into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations seemed to be collapsing.

However, it turned out to be a key moment that culminated in a deal, announced by President Donald Trump, to free all remaining hostages.

That represents a objective that Trump, and President Joe Biden before him, had pursued for almost 24 months.

This marks just the initial phase towards a lasting resolution, and the details of Hamas disarmament, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be negotiated.

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

Trump's unique style and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Arab world appear to have contributed in this breakthrough.

But, as with many diplomatic achievements, there were also factors at play beyond the influence of either man.

Strong Ties Which Eluded Biden

In public, Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

The president likes to say that Israel has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has described Trump as the country's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". And these positive statements have been backed up by actions.

During his first presidential term, the president moved the US embassy in Israel from its former location to the contested capital and abandoned a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the position under international law.

After Israel began its bombing campaign against Iran in June, the US leader ordered American aircraft to strike the Iran's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These visible shows of support may have allowed Trump the room to exert more pressure on the Israeli government behind the scenes. As per sources, Trump's negotiator, his representative, pressured Netanyahu in late 2024 into accepting a halt in fighting in exchange for the freeing of a number of captives.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in the summer, including hitting a place of worship, Trump pressured Netanyahu to alter tactics.

The leader displayed a level of determination and pressure on an Israeli prime minister that is virtually unprecedented, according to Aaron David Miller of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "There is no example of an American president directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

Biden's connection with the Israeli administration was consistently more strained.

The Biden team's "close embrace strategy" argued that the United States had to embrace Israel openly in order to enable it to moderate the country's war conduct in private.

Underneath this was Biden's decades-long of support for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his political base over the Gaza War. Every step the leader took endangered fracturing his own domestic support, while his successor's loyal conservative voters gave him more room to manoeuvre.

In the end, internal considerations or individual ties may have had little impact than the reality that, during Biden's presidency, the Israeli government was not ready to reach an agreement.

Several months into his new administration, with Iran chastened, Hezbollah to its northern border significantly reduced and Gaza devastated, all its major strategy objectives had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Assisted Secure 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 final demand to Netanyahu. The war had to end.

Trump had given Israel a relatively free hand in Gaza. The president lent US armed support to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. But an strike on Qatari territory was a different matter completely, moving him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to end the war.

A number of Trump officials have informed the press that this was a turning point which galvanised the leader to apply maximum pressure to finalize an agreement.

The leader's close ties with the Arab monarchies are widely known. He has business dealings with Qatar and the UAE. The president began each of his administrations with state visits to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also visited in Qatar and Abu Dhabi.

His normalization agreements, which established ties between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, such as the UAE, was the biggest foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

The time devoted in the capitals of the Arabian Peninsula in recent months contributed to change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. Trump did not visit Israel on this Middle East trip but visited the United Arab Emirates, the kingdom and Qatar where he heard consistent appeals to put a stop to the conflict.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on the city, the president sat nearby as Netanyahu himself called Qatar to apologise. Subsequently, the Israeli leader signed off on the president's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that additionally had the support of key Muslim nations in the area.

If Trump's alliance with Netanyahu gave him the room to influence Israel to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have secured their support, and assisted them convince the group to agree to the arrangement.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that President Trump developed influence with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," notes an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. His ability to do this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a challenge that lot of previous presidents have struggled with, and Trump seems to handle relatively successfully."

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

Currently the Israeli government has committed to freeing over a thousand Palestinians held in its jails and has agreed to a limited pullback from Gaza.

Hamas will release all the captives still held, both alive and deceased, taken in the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which resulted in the loss of over 1,200 Israeli citizens.

An end to the conflict, which has resulted in the destruction of Gaza and the deaths of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal