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Initially, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas negotiating team in Qatar seemed like yet another escalation that drove the hope of peace further away.

This strike on September 9 breached the territorial integrity of an American ally and risked expanding the hostilities into a region-wide war.

Negotiations seemed to be in ruins.

However, it turned out to be a pivotal event that has led in a deal, announced by President Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

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

It is just the first step towards a more durable peace, and the specifics of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and complete Israeli pullout are still to be negotiated.

Yet if this agreement holds, it could be Donald Trump's signature achievement of his second term - one that escaped Joe Biden and his administration.

Trump's distinct approach and crucial relationships with the Israeli government and the Arab world appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

However, as with many diplomatic achievements, there were also elements involved beyond the influence of either man.

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

In public, Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

Trump often states that Israel has no better friend, and Netanyahu has described Trump as the country's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". And these warm words have been matched by actions.

Throughout his initial time in office, the president relocated the American diplomatic mission in the country from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and discarded a long-held US position that Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the position under global norms.

When Israel began its air strikes against Iran in June, Trump directed American aircraft to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These visible shows of support may have allowed Trump the leeway to exert more pressure on the Israeli government in private. As per sources, Trump's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, pressured the prime minister in the latter part of the year into accepting a halt in fighting in exchange for the release of a number of captives.

When Israeli forces attacked against Syria's military in July, including hitting a place of worship, the US president urged his counterpart to alter tactics.

Trump exhibited a level of will and pressure on an Israel's leader that is rarely seen, says Aaron David Miller of the a think tank. "There is no example of an US leader literally telling an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

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

His administration's "bear hug strategy" held that the United States had to embrace Israel publicly in order to enable it to moderate the country's war conduct behind closed doors.

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. Every step the leader took risked dividing his own political backing, whereas his successor's solid Republican base gave him more room to act.

Ultimately, internal considerations or personal relationships may have had little impact than the reality that, during Biden's presidency, Israel 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 greatly diminished and Gaza in ruins, all its key military goals had been achieved.

Business History Assisted Gain Support from Arab States

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but no Hamas officials, led Trump to issue an ultimatum to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to end.

The US leader had given Israel a relatively free hand in Gaza. He lent American military might to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. But an attack on Qatari territory was a separate issue completely, pushing him towards the Arab position on how best to end the war.

A number of administration figures have told media outlets that this was a decisive moment which motivated the leader to exert full force to get a peace deal done.

This US president's close ties with the Arab monarchies are widely known. Trump has commercial interests with Qatar and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with official trips to the kingdom. This year, Trump also visited in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

His Abraham Accords, which established ties between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, including the UAE, was the biggest foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

His visits he spent in the cities of the Gulf region in recent months helped change his thinking, according to an expert of the a policy institute. The US president did not travel to the country on this Middle East trip but visited the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where the leader heard repeated calls to put a stop to the conflict.

Less than a month after that attack on the city, the president was present nearby as Netanyahu himself phoned the Qatari leadership to apologise. And later that day, the Israeli leader signed off on Trump's 20-point peace plan for the territory - one that additionally had the support of key Muslim nations in the region.

Assuming the president's alliance with Netanyahu provided him the ability to pressure Israel to strike a deal, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their backing, and helped them persuade the group to agree to the deal.

"A key factor that evidently occurred was that the US leader gained influence with the Israeli government, and indirectly with the militants," notes an analyst of the a research center.

"This was crucial. His ability to achieve this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the desires of the combatants has been a problem that lot of earlier administrations have faced, and he appears to do with some success."

The reality that Trump is far better liked in Israel than Netanyahu personally was leverage that Trump used to his benefit, he adds.

Now the Israeli government has committed to freeing more than 1,000 detainees imprisoned in Israeli prisons and has agreed to a partial withdrawal from Gaza.

The group will release all the captives still held, both alive and deceased, taken during the original 7 October assault, which resulted in the loss of over 1,200 Israelis.

A conclusion to the war, which has led to the destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal