A man armed with a knife killed a teacher and wounded two others on Friday in an attack at a school in northern France.

Antiterror prosecutors said they were taking over the investigation into the attack in the city of Arras, some 115 miles (185 kilometres) north of Paris.

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said that the suspected attacker was arrested. President Emmanuel Macron was heading to the scene.

French broadcasters France Info and BFM reported that the suspect is a former student.

Such school attacks are rare in France. The motive was not immediately clear. It came amid heightened tensions around the world over Hamas' weekend attack on southern Israel and Israel's military response, which have killed hundreds of civilians on both sides.

There have been calls in Muslim nations for mass protests after Friday prayers over Israel's intense bombing campaign in Gaza.

France's interior minister on Thursday ordered local authorities to ban all pro-Palestinian demonstrations amid a rise in antisemitic acts since the Hamas attack.

France is estimated to have the world's third-largest Jewish population after Israel and the US, and the largest Muslim population in Western Europe.

A vice president of France's lower house of parliament, Naima Moutchou, said the National Assembly “expresses its solidarity and thoughts for the victims, their families and the educational community as we learn that a teacher has been killed and several others have been injured.