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At first, the Israeli air strike on the Hamas negotiating team in Doha appeared like yet another escalation that pushed the prospect of peace out of reach.

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

Negotiations appeared to be collapsing.

However, it proved to be a pivotal event that culminated in a deal, announced by Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

That represents a goal that Trump, and Joe Biden previously, had pursued for almost 24 months.

This marks just the first step towards a lasting resolution, and the details of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and full Israeli withdrawal are still to be worked out.

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

Trump's distinct approach and key alliances with Israel and the Arab world appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

But, as with many diplomatic achievements, 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 likes to say that the nation has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has called Trump as Israel's "most supportive friend in the White House". And these warm words have been matched by actions.

Throughout his first presidential term, the president relocated the American diplomatic mission in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and discarded a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the view under global norms.

When the Israeli military began its air strikes against Iran in June, Trump ordered US bombers to strike the Iran's atomic sites with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those public demonstrations of backing may have given the president the leeway to exert more pressure on Israel behind the scenes. According to reports, the president's envoy, his representative, pressured the prime minister in the latter part of the year into accepting a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the freeing of some hostages.

After Israel attacked against Syrian forces in the summer, even hitting a place of worship, the US president pressured Netanyahu to change course.

The leader displayed a level of determination and insistence 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 directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that they must agree or else."

Biden's relationship with Netanyahu's government was consistently more tenuous.

The Biden team's "bear hug strategy" argued that the US had to embrace the nation openly in order to enable it to moderate the country's military actions in private.

Beneath this was the president's nearly half-century of support for Israel, as well as sharp divisions within his political base over the Gaza War. Every step the leader took risked fracturing his own political backing, whereas his successor's loyal conservative voters provided him more room to manoeuvre.

In the end, domestic politics or personal relationships may have had less importance than the simple fact that, during his term, the Israeli government was unwilling to reach an agreement.

Eight months into Trump's second term, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its northern border significantly reduced and the coastal strip in ruins, all its key military goals had been achieved.

Commercial Background Assisted Secure Gulf's Backing

The Israeli missile attack in Doha, which killed a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, led the president to deliver an ultimatum to Netanyahu. The war had to end.

The US leader had allowed the Israeli military a significant latitude in the territory. He provided US armed support to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. However an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue entirely, moving him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several Trump officials have told the press that this was a turning point which motivated the leader to apply maximum pressure to finalize an agreement.

This US president's close ties with the Gulf states are well documented. He has commercial interests with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. He began both his presidential terms with state visits to the kingdom. Recently, Trump also stopped in Qatar and the UAE capital.

The president's Abraham Accords, which established ties between Israel and several Muslim states, including the UAE, was the most significant diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

The time he spent in the cities of the Gulf region in recent months helped change his thinking, according to an expert of the Council on Foreign Relations. Trump did not visit the country on this regional tour but went to the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where the leader heard repeated calls to bring an end to the conflict.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on Doha, Trump sat close as Netanyahu himself phoned the Qatari leadership to apologise. Subsequently, the Israeli leader gave approval on the president's comprehensive proposal for the territory - one that also had the backing of influential Arab states in the area.

If the president's relationship with Netanyahu gave him the ability to influence Israel to strike a deal, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their support, and helped them persuade the group to commit to the arrangement.

"One of the things that clearly happened was that President Trump developed leverage with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," notes Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"This was crucial. The capacity to do this on his timing, and not succumb to the desires of the combatants has been a problem that many earlier administrations have struggled with, and he seems to do with some success."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in the nation than Netanyahu himself was an advantage that he used to his benefit, the expert continues.

Now Israel has committed to releasing more than 1,000 detainees held in Israeli prisons and has consented to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

The group will release all the remaining hostages, both alive and deceased, captured during the original 7 October Hamas attack, which caused the death of over 1,200 Israeli citizens.

An end to the war, which has resulted in the devastation of the territory and the deaths of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal