Jerusalem ? Israel’s government said Wednesday it would end its air and maritime blockade of Lebanon today to make way for an international force that is to deploy as part of a cease-fire that ended the 34-day conflict.

Israel’s decision came after U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan notified its leaders that the international forces were ready to take positions at Lebanon’s airports and along the coast, according to a statement from the office of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

Israeli officials said those assurances convinced them that Israel could ease its restrictions on the arrival and departure of ships and airplanes, an embargo it has said was aimed at preventing arms from reaching fighters of the Islamic militant Hezbollah movement.

“We said from the beginning that we’ll be willing to lift our restrictions when the Lebanese government, augmented by the internationals, would be able to enforce the arms embargo,” said Mark Regev, a spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry. “It’s come together in a way today to give us the confidence to lift the restrictions.”

The news was met with jubilation in Lebanon, where anxiety has been growing as the economic damage of the war was compounded by the lockdown.

The Lebanese government sent a formal request to Annan for German naval ships to help patrol the Mediterranean Sea. The Lebanese army will be charged with monitoring the Syrian border for signs of weapon smuggling, said Interior Minister Ahmed Fatfat.

Port workers take part in a protest march against Israel's air and sea blockade of Lebanon, along a route from Beirut's port to the parliament building. Later Wednesday, Israel announced that it would lift the blockade today.

“It’s very important to show that with diplomatic pressure and with political action we can have some solution in the Middle East,” Fatfat said. “It’s very important to show to the Arab nation and to the Lebanese population that there is another way besides war.”

A German team arrived at Beirut International Airport on Wednesday. The German naval forces were not due to arrive for two weeks, but Italian, French, British and Greek forces would deploy until then, Israel said.

Since the cease-fire took effect on Aug. 14, Israel has approved a limited number of ships and flights into and out of Lebanon despite the blockade, its officials said. But the embargo still cost the economy more than $20 million a day, the Lebanese government said.

Commercial air travel had slowed to a trickle, with the only a handful of flights a day, all of them routed through the airport in Amman, Jordan. The fishermen of Lebanon’s storied coast had languished on dry land, forbidden to sail into the sea to make their living.

Business owners fretted over shipments stuck in Turkey, Syria or Jordan. Blackouts, a perpetual problem in Lebanon in the best of times, grew more frequent as fuel supplies dwindled.

“It was contributing to higher costs, higher anxieties, delays,” said Marwan Iskander, an economist and head of a research firm. “It was constrictive. It made the country feel as if it was going to suffocate.”

Meanwhile, Lebanon toughened its stance on the two Israeli soldiers whose capture by Hezbollah helped trigger this summer’s war. The cease-fire agreement called for the unconditional release of the Israeli soldiers. But on Wednesday, the Lebanese foreign minister said the Israelis would only be freed if the two sides negotiated a prisoner swap.