How Trump Secured a Gaza Strip Major Step That Escaped Joe Biden

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

The attack on September 9 breached the sovereignty of an American ally and risked widening the conflict into a region-wide war.

Negotiations appeared to be collapsing.

Instead, it proved to be a key moment that culminated in a deal, declared by President Donald Trump, to release all captives still held.

This is a objective that Trump, and Joe Biden before him, had pursued for nearly two years.

It is just the initial phase towards a lasting resolution, and the specifics of Hamas disarmament, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal are still to be negotiated.

But if this deal stands, it could be Donald Trump's defining accomplishment of his second term - one that escaped Biden and his diplomatic team.

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

However, as with many diplomatic achievements, there were also elements involved beyond the control of either man.

Strong Ties Which Eluded Biden

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

Trump often states that the nation has no better friend, and the Israeli leader has described him as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the White House". Moreover these positive statements have been matched by actions.

During his initial time in office, Trump moved the American diplomatic mission in the country from its former location to Jerusalem and abandoned a long-held US position that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are illegal, the view under global norms.

After the Israeli military began its bombing campaign against Iran in June, the US leader directed American aircraft to strike the nation's atomic sites with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

These visible shows of backing may have given the president the room to exert more influence on Israel in private. As per sources, the president's negotiator, Steve Witkoff, browbeat Netanyahu in late 2024 into accepting a temporary ceasefire in return for the freeing of some hostages.

After Israeli forces attacked against Syrian forces in July, including bombing a Christian church, Trump urged Netanyahu to change course.

The leader displayed a level 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 literally telling an Israeli leader that you're going to have to comply or else."

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

The Biden team's "bear hug strategy" argued that the US had to embrace the nation openly in order to allow it to influence the nation's war conduct behind closed doors.

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

Ultimately, domestic politics or individual ties may have had less importance than the simple fact that, throughout his term, the Israeli government was not ready to make peace.

Several months into his new administration, with Iran chastened, the militant group to its northern border significantly reduced and the coastal strip in ruins, every one of its major strategy objectives had been accomplished.

Commercial Background Helped Secure Support from Arab States

The Israeli missile attack in the Qatari capital, which killed a Qatari citizen but no Hamas officials, led the president to deliver an ultimatum to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

Trump had given Israel a relatively free hand in the territory. The president provided US armed support to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. But an strike on Qatari territory was a separate issue completely, moving him towards the stance of Arab nations on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several administration figures have informed 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 Arab monarchies are well documented. He has business dealings with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. The president began each of his administrations with state visits to the kingdom. This year, he also stopped in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

His Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between Israel and a number of Arab nations, such as the UAE, was the biggest diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

His visits devoted in the capitals of the Gulf region in recent months helped shift his perspective, according to Ed Husain of the Council on Foreign Relations. The US president did not travel to the country on this regional tour but went to the UAE, the kingdom and Qatar where the leader received repeated calls to put a stop to the conflict.

Less than a month after that Israeli strike on Doha, the president sat close as the prime minister personally called Qatar to express regret. Subsequently, the prime minister gave approval on Trump's 20-point peace plan for the territory - one that also had the support of key Muslim nations in the area.

If the president's alliance with Netanyahu gave him the ability to influence the government to reach an agreement, his history with Muslim leaders may have ensured their support, and assisted them convince Hamas to commit to the arrangement.

"A key factor that evidently occurred was that the US leader gained influence with the Israeli government, and indirectly with Hamas," says an analyst of the a research center.

"This was crucial. The capacity to do this on his own schedule, and avoid yielding to the demands of the warring sides has been a challenge that many previous presidents have faced, and Trump seems to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that Trump is much more popular in Israel than the prime minister himself was leverage that he employed to his benefit, he adds.

Currently Israel has agreed to freeing over a thousand Palestinians 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 in the initial October 7 assault, which resulted in the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

An end to the conflict, which has resulted in the destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal