Filed at 3:33 p.m. ET

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel said Sunday it was easing a land blockade on the Gaza Strip to allow in all goods except for arms and materials used to make them.

The softening of a policy criticised as collective punishment of Gaza's 1.5 million Palestinians to weaken their hardline Islamist leaders follows an Israeli raid on a blockade-running flotilla in which nine activists died.

The United States quickly welcomed the shift and said President Barack Obama would hold a delayed meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington on July 6.

Israel's old rules banned everything it chose not to let in.

Netanyahu said Israel would "as quickly as possible" publish a list of banned goods and all items not on it would be allowed in to the Palestinian territory run by the Hamas Islamist group.