Jerusalem ? A strike by public service workers ended Wednesday after just eight hours, when the Israeli government agreed to pay back wages.

The open-ended strike was expected to shut down most services, including Israeli airports and seaports, but as the two sides kept in contact, it appeared it would not last long enough to do significant damage.

At Israel’s airport, a traditional target of work stoppages, most planes took off and landed more or less on schedule as an “exceptions committee” approved many flights.

General strikes in Israel encompass a wide array of services, and much of the country was paralyzed. Government offices were shuttered, and state-run utilities operated on skeleton staffs, carrying out no repairs. A Histadrut spokesman said as many as 150,000 workers throughout the country walked off the job. After marathon talks with the government, the strike was settled.