How Donald Trump Achieved a Gaza Breakthrough That Escaped Joe Biden

Initially, the Israeli aerial attack on the Hamas negotiating team in Qatar seemed like another intensification that drove the prospect of a ceasefire further away.

The attack on 9 September violated the sovereignty of an US partner and threatened widening the hostilities into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations appeared to be in ruins.

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

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

It is just the initial phase 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 Donald Trump's defining accomplishment of his return to office - one that eluded Biden and his administration.

The president's unique style and key alliances with Israel and the Middle Eastern nations seem to have played a role in this success.

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

A Close Relationship That Biden Never Had

Publicly, Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

The president likes to say that the nation has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has called him as the country's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". And these positive statements have been backed up by actions.

Throughout his initial time in office, the president moved the US embassy in the country from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and abandoned a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are illegal, the view under international law.

When the Israeli military began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in June, Trump ordered American aircraft to strike the Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities with its most powerful conventional bombs.

Those visible shows of backing may have allowed the president the leeway to exert more pressure on Israel behind the scenes. As per sources, the president's negotiator, his representative, pressured Netanyahu in late 2024 into accepting a temporary ceasefire in return for the freeing of a number of captives.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in the summer, including hitting a place of worship, Trump urged Netanyahu to alter tactics.

Trump exhibited a level of will and pressure 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 US leader literally telling an Israeli leader that you're going to have to comply or else."

Joe Biden's relationship with Netanyahu's government was consistently more strained.

His administration's "close embrace strategy" held that the US had to support Israel openly in order to allow it to influence the nation's military actions in private.

Underneath this was Biden's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his Democratic coalition over the Gaza War. Each move the leader took risked dividing his own domestic support, while his successor's loyal conservative voters gave him more flexibility to act.

In the end, domestic politics or personal relationships may have had less importance than the reality that, during his term, Israel was not ready to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic weakened, Hezbollah to its northern border significantly reduced and Gaza in ruins, every one of its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Business History Assisted 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 issue an final demand to Netanyahu. Hostilities had to stop.

The US leader had given the Israeli military a relatively free hand in Gaza. The president lent American military might to Israeli operations in Iran. But an attack on Qatar soil was a separate issue completely, moving him towards the Arab position on how best to end the war.

Several administration figures have informed the press that this was a decisive moment which motivated the leader to apply maximum pressure 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. The president began both his presidential terms with official trips to Saudi Arabia. This year, he also visited in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

His normalization agreements, which normalised relations between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, such as the Emirates, was the biggest diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

His visits devoted in the capitals 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 visit the country on this Middle East trip but went to the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where he received repeated calls to bring an end to the war.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on the city, Trump was present nearby as Netanyahu personally called the Qatari leadership to apologise. And later that day, the Israeli leader signed off on the president's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that additionally had the backing of key Muslim nations in the area.

Assuming the president's alliance with Netanyahu provided him the ability to pressure Israel to reach an agreement, his history with Arab rulers may have secured their support, and assisted them convince Hamas to agree to the arrangement.

"One of the things that clearly happened was that President Trump developed influence with the Israeli government, and indirectly with the militants," notes an analyst of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. The capacity to achieve this on his timing, and not succumb to the demands of the warring sides has been a problem that lot of earlier administrations have faced, and Trump appears to handle relatively successfully."

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

Currently Israel has committed to releasing more than 1,000 Palestinians imprisoned in its jails and has consented to a partial withdrawal from the strip.

The group will release all the captives still held, both alive and deceased, captured during the initial October 7 assault, which caused the loss of over 1,200 Israeli citizens.

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