🔗 Share this article

Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas delegation in Qatar appeared like another escalation that pushed the prospect of a ceasefire further away.

The attack on September 9 breached the territorial integrity of an American ally and risked widening the conflict into a broader regional conflict.

Diplomacy appeared to be in ruins.

Instead, it turned out to be a key moment that has led in a deal, announced by Donald Trump, to free all remaining hostages.

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

This marks just the initial phase towards a lasting resolution, and the details of Hamas disarmament, administering Gaza and complete Israeli pullout are still to be negotiated.

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

Trump's distinct approach and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Middle Eastern nations seem to have played a role in this breakthrough.

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

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

In public, Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

Trump often states that the nation has no better friend, and Netanyahu has called Trump as the country's "most supportive friend in the White House". And these warm words have been matched by actions.

During his first presidential term, the president relocated the American diplomatic mission in the country from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and abandoned a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, the position under global norms.

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

These public demonstrations of backing may have given the president the leeway to apply more influence on the Israeli government behind the scenes. According to reports, the president's envoy, his representative, pressured Netanyahu in the latter part of the year into accepting a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the release of a number of captives.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in July, including bombing a Christian church, the US president pressured Netanyahu to alter tactics.

Trump exhibited a degree of will and insistence 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 relationship with the Israeli administration was consistently more tenuous.

The Biden team's "bear hug approach" argued that the United States had to support Israel publicly in order to allow it to moderate the country's war conduct behind closed doors.

Underneath this was the president's nearly half-century of backing for the state, as well as sharp divisions within his Democratic coalition over the conflict in Gaza. Each move Biden took endangered fracturing his own domestic support, while Trump's solid Republican base provided him more room 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 not ready to reach an agreement.

Several months into Trump's second term, with the Islamic Republic chastened, Hezbollah to its northern border significantly reduced and Gaza in ruins, all its key military goals had been achieved.

Commercial Background Helped Gain Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in Doha, which resulted in the death of a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, led the president to deliver an ultimatum to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

Trump had allowed the Israeli military a significant latitude in the territory. The president lent American military might to Israel's campaign in Iran. However an attack on Qatar soil was a different matter entirely, pushing him towards the Arab position on how best to end the war.

A number of administration figures have told the press that this was a turning point which motivated the president to exert full force to get a peace deal done.

The leader's close ties with the Gulf states are widely known. He has business dealings with the emirate and the UAE. He began each of his administrations with official trips to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also stopped in Qatar and Abu Dhabi.

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

His visits devoted in the cities of the Arabian Peninsula earlier this year contributed to shift his perspective, according to Ed Husain of the a policy institute. Trump did not visit Israel on this regional tour but went to the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and the state where the leader heard consistent appeals to bring an end to the conflict.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on Doha, the president sat close as Netanyahu personally called the Qatari leadership to express regret. 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 influential Arab states in the area.

If Trump's alliance with Netanyahu provided him the room to influence Israel to strike a deal, his past with Muslim leaders may have secured their backing, and helped them convince the group to commit to the deal.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that the US leader developed leverage with the Israeli government, and through intermediaries with the militants," says Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. His ability to do this on his timing, 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 do relatively successfully."

The fact that the president is much more popular in Israel than Netanyahu personally was an advantage that he employed to his benefit, he adds.

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

Hamas will release all the remaining hostages, living and dead, captured during the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which resulted in the loss of more than 1,200 Israelis.

An end to the conflict, which has led to the destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal