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Reports of an upcoming US-Russia leadership summit have been overstated, apparently.

Only a few days after Donald Trump announced he intended to confer with Russia's leader Vladimir Putin in the Hungarian capital - "within two weeks or so" - the high-level talks has been put off without a new date.

A initial get-together by the both countries' top diplomats has been cancelled, too.

"I don't want to have a fruitless discussion," President Trump informed the press at the White House on a recent weekday. "I don't want a pointless effort, so I'll see what happens."

• Trump states he did not want a 'unproductive session' after plan for negotiations with Putin shelved
• Letdown in Ukraine's capital as Zelensky leaves White House without results

The on-again, off-again meeting is just the latest development in the president's efforts to broker an conclusion to hostilities in the Eastern European nation – a topic of renewed focus for the US president after he arranged a ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal in Gaza.

While making remarks in the North African country recently to celebrate that ceasefire agreement, the president turned to his lead diplomatic negotiator, with a fresh directive.

"We have to get the Russian situation resolved," he declared.

Nonetheless, the circumstances that converged to make a Middle East success possible for the negotiation team may be challenging to duplicate in a Ukraine war that has been raging for nearing four years.

Less Leverage

Per the lead negotiator, the crucial element to unlocking a agreement was the Israeli government's move to attack Hamas negotiators in the Gulf state. It was a move that infuriated US partners in the Arab world but gave the president bargaining power to compel Israel's leader Netanyahu into making a deal.

Trump gained from a history of siding with Israel since his initial presidency, including his choice to move the American embassy to Jerusalem, to change America's position on the lawfulness of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories and, more recently, his backing for Israel's military campaign against the Islamic Republic.

The US president, actually, is better regarded among the Israeli public than their prime minister – a situation that provided him with special sway over the Israeli leader.

Combine the president's political and economic ties to influential Arab nations in the area, and he had a wealth of negotiating strength to force an deal.

In the Ukraine war, on the other hand, the president has significantly reduced influence. Over the past nine months, he has vacillated between efforts to strong-arm Putin and then the Ukrainian leader, all with little seeming effect.

The US leader has threatened to impose additional penalties on Russia's oil and gas sales and to supply the Ukrainian forces with new long-range weapons. But he has also recognised that such actions could harm the global economy and intensify the conflict.

At the same time, the president has publicly berated Ukraine's president, temporarily cutting off intelligence-sharing with Ukraine and suspending weapon deliveries to the country - only to then retreat in the face of concerned European allies who warn a defeat of Ukraine could disrupt the entire region.

Trump loves to tout his ability to sit down and hammer out deals, but his face-to-face meetings with both Putin and Zelensky haven't seemed to advance the hostilities any nearer a resolution.

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

In July, Russia's leader agreed to a summit in the US state at the time when it seemed probable that the president would sign off on congressional sanctions package supported by Senate Republicans. That bill was subsequently delayed.

Recently, as news emerged that the White House was considering seriously shipping Tomahawk cruise missiles and Patriot anti-air batteries to Kyiv, the Russian leader called the US president who then touted the potential summit in Budapest.

The next day, the president hosted Ukraine's leader at the White House, but left empty-handed after a allegedly tense meeting.

The US leader insisted that he was not being manipulated by the Russian president.

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

However the Ukrainian leader later commented on the timeline of developments.

"As soon as the matter of long-range mobility became a little further away for us – for our nation – Russia quickly became less engaged in diplomacy," he said.

Thus, in a short period, Trump has bounced from entertaining the prospect of providing weapons to Ukraine to planning a meeting in Hungary with Russia's leader and confidentially urging the Ukrainian president to cede all of Donbas – even land Russia has been unable to conquer.

He has ultimately decided on calling for a ceasefire along current battle lines – a proposal the Russian government has rejected.

During his election campaign previously, Trump promised that he could end the Ukraine war in a matter of hours. He has subsequently abandoned that pledge, saying that ending the hostilities is proving harder than he expected.

It has been a uncommon admission of the constraints of his authority – and the difficulty of finding a peace plan when both parties desires, or can afford to, give up the fight.