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Reports of an upcoming American-Russian presidential meeting have been overstated, apparently.

Just days after President Trump announced he planned to confer with Russian President Putin in Budapest - "in approximately a fortnight" - the high-level talks has been suspended indefinitely.

A initial get-together by the both countries' leading diplomats has been called off, as well.

"I don't want to have a wasted meeting," President Trump informed reporters at the executive mansion on Tuesday afternoon. "I don't want a pointless effort, so I'll see what happens."

• Donald Trump states he did not want a 'unproductive session' after arrangement for Putin talks shelved
• Letdown in Kyiv as President Zelensky leaves Washington without results

The frequently changing meeting is just the latest twist in the president's attempts to broker an conclusion to hostilities in Ukraine – a topic of renewed focus for the US president after he orchestrated a truce and hostage release agreement in the Palestinian territory.

During a speech in the North African country last week to commemorate that truce deal, Trump turned to his lead diplomatic negotiator, with a new request.

"It is essential to get Russia done," he said.

Nonetheless, the conditions that converged to make a Middle East success possible for the negotiation team may be difficult to duplicate in a conflict in Ukraine that has been raging for almost several years.

Less Leverage

According to Witkoff, the key to achieving a agreement was the Israeli government's move to attack representatives of Hamas in the Gulf state. It was a move that infuriated US partners in the Arab world but gave Trump leverage to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu into making a deal.

The US president gained from a history of supporting the Israeli state since his first term, including his decision to move the American embassy to Jerusalem, to alter US policy on the lawfulness of Jewish communities in the West Bank and, in recent times, his backing for Israel's military campaign against Iran.

The US president, actually, is more popular among Israelis than their prime minister – a position that provided him with special sway over the Israeli leader.

Add in the president's connections in politics and business to key Arab players in the region, and he had a wealth of diplomatic muscle to force an agreement.

Regarding the conflict in Ukraine, by contrast, Trump has much less leverage. Over the past nine months, he has vacillated between efforts to pressure Putin and then Zelensky, all with little seeming effect.

The US leader has threatened to impose new sanctions on Russian energy exports and to supply the Ukrainian forces with new long-range weapons. But he has also acknowledged that doing so could disrupt the global economy and intensify the conflict.

At the same time, the president has criticized openly Ukraine's president, temporarily cutting off information exchange with Ukraine and pausing weapon deliveries to the country - only to then retreat in the wake of concerned European allies who caution a defeat of Ukraine could destabilise the entire region.

Trump often boasts about his skill to sit down and hammer out deals, but his face-to-face meetings with the Russian and Ukrainian leaders have not appeared to move the hostilities any closer to a peaceful end.

The Russian president may actually be using Trump's desire for a settlement – and faith in in-person deal-making - as a method of manipulating him.

In July, Putin agreed to a summit in Alaska at the time when it seemed probable that the president would approve on congressional sanctions package backed by Senate Republicans. That bill was subsequently delayed.

Last week, as reports spread that the US administration was considering seriously sending Tomahawk cruise missiles and Patriot anti-air batteries to Kyiv, the Russian leader called the US president who then promoted the possible summit in Budapest.

The following day, the president welcomed Ukraine's leader at the White House, but departed without agreements after a reportedly strained discussion.

Trump insisted that he was not being played by the Russian president.

"As you are aware, I have been manipulated all my life by skilled operators, and I came out successfully," he said.

But the president of Ukraine subsequently made note of the sequence of events.

"As soon as the matter of long-range mobility became a less accessible for Ukraine – for our nation – the Russian side quickly became less interested in negotiations," he stated.

Thus, in a short period, Trump has bounced from entertaining the prospect of sending missiles to Ukraine to planning a meeting in Hungary with Putin and privately urging Zelensky to surrender all of Donbas – even territory Russia has been failed to capture.

He has finally decided on advocating a ceasefire along present frontlines – a proposal the Russian government has rejected.

During his election campaign last year, Trump vowed that he could resolve the conflict in Ukraine in a very short time. He has subsequently discarded that pledge, saying that concluding the hostilities is proving harder than he anticipated.

It has been a rare acknowledgement of the constraints of his power – and the challenge of establishing a peace plan when neither side wants, or is able to, cease hostilities.