🔗 Share this article

Initially, the Israeli air strike on the Hamas militant delegation in Doha seemed like yet another escalation that pushed the hope of peace out of reach.

The attack on 9 September violated the sovereignty of an American ally and threatened widening the hostilities into a region-wide war.

Negotiations appeared to be collapsing.

Instead, it proved to be a key moment that has led in a agreement, declared by President Donald Trump, to release all remaining hostages.

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

It is just the initial phase towards a more durable peace, and the details of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and complete Israeli pullout remain to be worked out.

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

The president's distinct approach and key alliances with the Israeli government and the Arab world appear to have contributed in this breakthrough.

However, as with most diplomatic achievements, there were also factors at play beyond the control of either man.

Strong Ties That Eluded Biden

In public, Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

Trump often states that Israel has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has described Trump as the country's "most supportive friend in the White House". Moreover these warm words have been matched by actions.

Throughout his initial time in office, Trump moved the US embassy in the country from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and abandoned a traditional American stance that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are illegal, the view under global norms.

When the Israeli military began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in June, Trump ordered US bombers to target the Iran's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

These visible shows of backing may have allowed Trump the leeway to apply more pressure on the Israeli government in private. As per sources, Trump's envoy, his representative, browbeat the prime minister in the latter part of the year into accepting a halt in fighting in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syria's military in the summer, even bombing a Christian church, Trump pressured his counterpart to change course.

Trump exhibited a degree of determination and insistence on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, according to an analyst of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "There is no example of an American president directly instructing an Israeli leader that they must agree or else."

Biden's relationship 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 moderate the country's military actions behind closed doors.

Underneath this was the president's decades-long of backing for Israel, as well as sharp divisions within his political base over the conflict in Gaza. Each move Biden took risked dividing his own political backing, while his successor's solid Republican base provided him more room to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, internal considerations or personal relationships may have had less importance than the simple fact that, during his term, the Israeli government was not ready to reach an agreement.

Eight months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic weakened, the militant group to its immediate north greatly diminished and the coastal strip devastated, every one of its major strategy objectives had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Helped Gain Gulf's Backing

The Israeli missile attack in Doha, which resulted in the death of a local national but not the intended targets, led Trump to issue an final demand to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to end.

The US leader had allowed Israel a relatively free hand in Gaza. The president provided American military might to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. However an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue entirely, pushing him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to conclude the conflict.

A number of administration figures have informed media outlets that this was a decisive moment which galvanised the leader to apply full force to finalize an agreement.

The leader's close ties with the Arab monarchies are widely known. Trump has business dealings with Qatar and the UAE. He began both his presidential terms with official trips to Saudi Arabia. Recently, Trump also stopped in Qatar and the UAE capital.

The president's Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between Israel and several Muslim states, such as the UAE, was the biggest diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

The time he spent in the capitals of the Gulf region earlier this year helped shift his perspective, according to Ed Husain of the Council on Foreign Relations. Trump did not visit Israel on this Middle East trip but visited the UAE, the kingdom and Qatar where the leader heard consistent appeals to bring an end to the war.

Within weeks 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 gave approval on the president's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the support of key Muslim nations in the area.

Assuming the president's relationship with his counterpart gave him the room to pressure the government to strike a deal, his past with Arab rulers may have ensured their backing, and assisted them persuade Hamas to agree to the arrangement.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that the US leader developed leverage with the Israelis, and through intermediaries with Hamas," notes an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. The capacity to achieve this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the desires of the combatants has been a challenge that lot of previous presidents have struggled with, and he appears to do with some success."

The reality that the president is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister personally was an advantage that Trump employed to his advantage, he adds.

Now Israel has agreed to releasing over a thousand Palestinians imprisoned in Israeli prisons and has consented to a limited pullback from the strip.

Hamas will release all the captives still held, living and dead, taken during the initial October 7 Hamas attack, 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