🔗 Share this article

Initially, Israel's air strike on the Hamas delegation in Doha seemed like another intensification that pushed the hope of a ceasefire further away.

This strike on September 9 violated the territorial integrity of an American ally and threatened widening the hostilities into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations seemed to be collapsing.

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

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

It is just the first step towards a lasting resolution, and the specifics of disarming Hamas, Gaza governance and complete Israeli pullout remain to be worked out.

Yet if this agreement 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 Middle Eastern nations appear to have played a role in this breakthrough.

But, as with most foreign policy wins, there were also factors involved beyond the control of either man.

A Close Relationship That Biden Never Had

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are all smiles.

Trump likes to say that the nation has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has described him as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". Moreover these warm words have been backed up by actions.

During his initial time in office, the president relocated the US embassy in the country from its former location to Jerusalem and discarded a traditional American stance that Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the view under global norms.

When Israel began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in June, Trump ordered American aircraft to strike the nation's nuclear enrichment facilities with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those public demonstrations of backing may have allowed the president the leeway to exert more influence on the Israeli government behind the scenes. As per sources, the president's envoy, his representative, pressured the prime minister in late 2024 into agreeing to a halt in fighting in exchange for the release of some hostages.

After Israel attacked against Syrian forces in the summer, even bombing a Christian church, the US president pressured his counterpart to change course.

The leader exhibited a level of determination and insistence on an Israeli prime minister that is rarely seen, according to an analyst of the a think tank. "It's unheard of of an American president directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

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

The Biden team's "close embrace strategy" argued that the United States had to embrace Israel openly in order to allow it to moderate the nation's military actions behind closed doors.

Beneath this was Biden's nearly half-century of support for Israel, as well as sharp divisions within his political base over the Gaza War. Every step Biden took risked fracturing his own domestic support, whereas Trump's solid Republican base gave him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

In the end, domestic politics or individual ties may have had less importance than the reality that, throughout his term, the Israeli government was unwilling to make peace.

Several months into Trump's second term, with Iran weakened, the militant group to its northern border significantly reduced and the coastal strip devastated, every one of its major strategy objectives had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Assisted Gain Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in the Qatari capital, which resulted in the death of a local national but not the intended targets, led Trump to deliver an final demand to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to stop.

The US leader had given Israel a significant latitude in Gaza. He lent American military might to Israel's campaign in Iran. However an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue completely, pushing him closer to the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several Trump officials have told the press that this was a decisive moment which motivated the president to exert full force to get a peace deal done.

The leader's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are well documented. Trump has commercial interests with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. He began both his presidential terms with state visits to Saudi Arabia. This year, he also visited in Qatar and Abu Dhabi.

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

The time devoted in the cities of the Gulf region in recent months contributed to change his thinking, according to Ed Husain of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not travel to Israel on this regional tour but visited the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where he heard consistent appeals to put a stop to the war.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on Doha, Trump was present close as the prime minister personally called the Qatari leadership to express regret. Subsequently, the Israeli leader signed off on Trump's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the backing of key Muslim nations in the area.

If the president's alliance with his counterpart gave him the room to influence Israel to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have ensured their backing, and helped them persuade the group to agree to the arrangement.

"A key factor that evidently occurred was that President Trump gained leverage with the Israelis, and indirectly with Hamas," notes Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. The capacity to achieve this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the demands of the warring sides has been a problem that lot of previous presidents have struggled with, and he appears to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that the president is far better liked in Israel than Netanyahu personally was an advantage that he employed to his advantage, he adds.

Now the Israeli government has committed to freeing more than 1,000 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons and has consented to a limited pullback from Gaza.

The group will free all the remaining hostages, living and dead, taken during the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which caused the loss of over 1,200 Israelis.

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