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

Just days after Donald Trump announced he intended to meet Russia's leader Vladimir Putin in the Hungarian capital - "in approximately a fortnight" - the summit has been put off without a new date.

A initial meeting by the two nations' leading diplomats has been cancelled, as well.

"I prefer not to have a wasted meeting," Donald Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday afternoon. "I aim to avoid a waste of time, so I will observe what transpires."

• Trump states he wished to avoid a 'wasted meeting' after arrangement for Putin talks shelved
• Letdown in Kyiv as Zelensky leaves White House empty-handed

The on-again, off-again summit is just the latest twist in Trump's efforts to broker an conclusion to hostilities in the Eastern European nation – a topic of increased attention for the American leader after he orchestrated a truce and prisoner exchange agreement in the Palestinian territory.

During a speech in Egypt recently to commemorate that truce deal, Trump turned to his lead diplomatic negotiator, with a new request.

"It is essential to get Russia resolved," he declared.

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

Less Leverage

According to the lead negotiator, the crucial element to achieving a deal was the Israeli government's move to strike representatives of Hamas in Qatar. It was a move that infuriated America's Arab allies but provided the president leverage to pressure Israel's leader Netanyahu into reaching an agreement.

The US president gained from a history of supporting Israel since his first term, including his decision to relocate the US embassy to Jerusalem, to alter America's position on the lawfulness of Jewish communities in the occupied territories and, in recent times, his support for Israeli defense operations against Iran.

The US president, in fact, is better regarded among the Israeli public than their prime minister – a position that provided him with unique influence over the nation's head.

Add in the president's political and economic ties to key Arab players in the area, and he had a wealth of negotiating strength to secure an deal.

In the Ukraine war, on the other hand, Trump has much less influence. Over the past nine months, he has swung between attempts to pressure Putin and then the Ukrainian leader, all with little seeming effect.

The US leader has threatened to impose new sanctions on Russian energy exports and to provide the Ukrainian forces with advanced missile systems. But he has also recognised that doing so could harm the world's financial stability and further escalate the conflict.

Meanwhile, the US leader has criticized openly Zelensky, halting briefly information exchange with the country and suspending weapon deliveries to the country - then to retreat in the face of concerned European allies who caution a defeat of Ukraine could destabilise the entire region.

Trump often boasts about his ability to sit down and hammer out deals, but his personal discussions with the Russian and Ukrainian leaders have not appeared to advance the war any closer to a peaceful end.

The Russian president may in fact be exploiting Trump's desire for a settlement – and belief in direct negotiations - as a means of manipulating him.

During the summer, Russia's leader consented to a summit in Alaska just as it appeared likely that the president would sign off on congressional sanctions package supported by GOP senators. That legislation was afterwards delayed.

Recently, as news emerged that the White House was seriously contemplating shipping long-range missiles and Patriot anti-air batteries to Kyiv, the president of Russia called Trump who then promoted the potential summit in Hungary.

The next day, the president welcomed Zelensky at the White House, but left without agreements after a reportedly strained discussion.

Trump insisted that he was not being played by Putin.

"As you are aware, I've been played all my life by the best of them, and I emerged successfully," he remarked.

However the Ukrainian leader subsequently commented on the sequence of events.

"Once the issue of advanced weaponry became a less accessible for us – for Ukraine – Russia almost automatically became less engaged in negotiations," he said.

So, in a matter of days, the president has shifted from considering the idea of sending missiles to the Eastern European country to organizing a meeting in Hungary with Putin and confidentially pressuring the Ukrainian president to surrender the entire Donbas region – including territory Russian forces has been failed to capture.

He has ultimately settled on calling for a ceasefire along current battle lines – something Russia has rejected.

On the campaign trail last year, the candidate vowed that he could end the conflict in Ukraine in a very short time. He has subsequently abandoned that pledge, saying that ending the hostilities is proving harder than he expected.

It has been a rare acknowledgement of the constraints of his authority – and the challenge of finding a peace plan when neither side wants, or can afford to, give up the fight.