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France has suggested it would not necessarily detain Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he entered the country despite an outstanding arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court over alleged war crimes in Gaza.

The French foreign ministry on Wednesday said Netanyahu could have immunity from arrest because Israel has not signed the Rome Statute, which established the ICC.

“A state cannot be compelled to act in a manner that is incompatible with its obligations under international law regarding the immunities of states not party to the ICC,” it said. “Such immunities apply to Prime Minister Netanyahu and other concerned ministers and must be taken into account if the ICC were to request their arrest and surrender.”

The French statement, which came a day after Paris helped the US broker a ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon, risks undermining the ICC by raising questions about its jurisdiction.

Rights groups including Amnesty International criticised the French position as “deeply problematic” because it ran counter to its obligations as an ICC member.

The Hague-based court last week issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant “for crimes against humanity and war crimes” allegedly committed in Israel’s offensive in Gaza.

The ICC’s 124 member states — which include most European and Latin American countries and many in Africa and Asia — are obliged to arrest Netanyahu and Gallant if they enter their territory. But the court has no means of enforcing the warrants if they do not.

While Israel is not a signatory to the Rome Statute, a 2021 ICC ruling said the court has jurisdiction over offences committed in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip because the Palestinian territories are signatories.

The relationship between the Israeli prime minister and Emmanuel Macron, president of France, has become increasingly strained, with French officials sharply criticising Israel’s military operations in Gaza and Lebanon.

But France has also played a key role in trying to prevent the conflicts in the region from spreading.

The ICC warrants were a flashpoint in the muti-party talks over the Lebanon ceasefire because French foreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot angered Netanyahu after he suggested France would comply with the warrant. Barrot said “France will always apply international law” without clarifying exactly what he meant.

The warrants have sparked outrage in Israel, with Netanyahu’s office branding them “antisemitic” and calling the ICC “a biased and discriminatory political body”.

Israel on Wednesday filed appeals to the ICC over the war crimes charges and requested the court suspend the warrants pending the outcome.

According to the Rome Statute, the ICC has jurisdiction over all heads of state or government, even if “immunities or special procedural rules” exist under domestic or international law.

But article 98 of the statute says the court cannot request an arrest that would require a state to “act inconsistently with its obligations under international law” regarding an individual’s diplomatic immunity.

French officials did not give further details of the basis for their stance, but it raised questions over whether the same reasoning could apply to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is subject to an ICC arrest warrant for war crimes in Ukraine. Like Israel, Moscow is not a signatory to the Rome Statute.

Macron’s opponents in France attacked the government’s statement and accused it of adopting the position to gain Israel’s support for the ceasefire.

“France is once again bowing to Benjamin Netanyahu’s demands by choosing him over international justice,” said Green leader Marine Tondelier on social network X, adding that it set a dangerous precedent.

“If we follow the logic . . . to its conclusion, what should we understand? That Putin will not be arrested if he comes to Unesco? This is a serious historical error,” she wrote.

Additional reporting by Suzi Ring in London

Pastor Chris Morgan leads a service at Christ United Methodist Church in Bethel Park, Pa., on the Sunday after Election Day.

Justin Merriman for NPR

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Justin Merriman for NPR

Pastor Chris Morgan leads a service at Christ United Methodist Church in Bethel Park, Pa., on the Sunday after Election Day.

Justin Merriman for NPR

On a Sunday in mid-July, Pastor Chris Morgan welcomed worshipers to Christ United Methodist Church in suburban Pittsburgh with a simple message.

That Sunday was particularly difficult.

A day earlier, a man had nearly assassinated then-candidate Donald Trump forty miles north in Butler. Morgan asked people to pray for Trump and those killed and injured in the shooting, and asked the congregation to pray for the family of the shooter.

Morgan had already planned a sermon series, called Do Unto Others, to deal with the nation’s — and his congregation’s — political divisions ahead of Election Day.

NPR’s Frank Langfitt went to Christ Church the weekend before Election Day – and the weekend after – to see if the efforts there made a difference.

As Americans prepare to come together at Thanksgiving, how do we bridge this country’s political divide? And can we?

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

A US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hizbollah appeared to be holding on Wednesday morning, raising hopes that some of the more than 1mn Lebanese civilians displaced by the conflict would be able to return home.

The deal, which took effect at 4am local time, was described by US President Joe Biden as “designed to be a permanent cessation of hostilities”.

Thousands of evacuated residents attempted to return to their homes in Beirut’s bombed-out southern suburbs on Wednesday, as the Lebanese government gave its official backing to the ceasefire.

“Today we begin the process of rebuilding what was destroyed,” said Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati. “Despite the great pain and this great catastrophe that afflicted the nation . . . it is a new day.”

But in a sign of the fragility of the deal, the Israel Defense Forces issued an “urgent message” to the residents of southern Lebanon, warning them not to return to their villages or approach Israeli forces.

An Israeli security official said the country’s jets were still patrolling over Lebanon and that ground troops were positioned inland and “prepared for any developments and any violations”.

He added that since the morning there had been “several instances” in which “suspicious people” had come close to Israeli troops, who responded with warning fire. 

The official said such “isolated events” could recur in coming hours “until people understand what’s happening on the ground”.

The Lebanese army also called on civilians to wait before returning to “occupied territories” in the south of the country and to exercise caution due to unexploded ordnance in other areas.

More than 1mn Lebanese people have been displaced by the fighting, which was triggered when Hizbollah, the Iran-backed militant group, began firing into northern Israel in the days after Hamas’s October 7 2023 attack from Gaza.

About 60,000 Israelis have also been evacuated from the north of their country due to Hizbollah rocket, missile and drone fire.

During the conflict, more than 3,700 Lebanese and more than 140 Israelis have been killed.

The offensive dealt a series of devastating blows to Hizbollah, killing its longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah and damaging large amounts of its weapons and infrastructure, as well as destroying broad swaths of the country’s east and south.

In a pre-recorded video message on Tuesday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the objective of the war had been to return northern Israeli residents to their homes. But he stopped short of calling for them to do so immediately.

Northern Israeli mayors and regional council heads had blasted Netanyahu on Tuesday for agreeing the deal with Hizbollah.

Under the terms of the agreement, announced by Biden and approved by Israel’s cabinet, the IDF will gradually withdraw from Lebanon over a period of 60 days and be replaced by the Lebanese army.

The Lebanese government is formally required to “prevent Hizbollah and all other armed groups in the territory of Lebanon from carrying out any operations against Israel”, while Israel is obliged “not to carry out any offensive military operations against Lebanese targets”.

Hizbollah will be barred from rebuilding its infrastructure in southern parts of Lebanon. The group’s fighters are meant to move mainly north of the Litani river, which runs up to 30km from the Israel-Lebanon border.

The deal is based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the previous Israel-Hizbollah war in 2006, but was never properly implemented.

Hizbollah has accepted the ceasefire agreement, according to people involved in the negotiations.

Iran also welcomed the ceasefire, despite previously insisting that Israel had to end its war against Hamas in Gaza before the hostilities could stop.

Hizbollah is the most powerful force in the Tehran-led “axis of resistance”, an umbrella of militant groups that began launching attacks against Israel in solidarity with Hamas.

Hamas itself issued a statement commending Hizbollah’s “immense sacrifices” and the “pivotal role” it had played over the past year’s hostilities, but stopped short of praising the ceasefire.

Biden said the US and France would work with Israel and Lebanon for this week’s deal to be fully implemented, adding there would be no US troops deployed in southern Lebanon.

He added that his administration would pursue an effort to revive talks among Turkey, Egypt, Qatar and Israel on a Gaza ceasefire.

Mike Waltz, the national security adviser of president-elect Donald Trump, has also hailed what he termed “concrete steps towards de-escalation in the Middle East”.

In parts of Dahiyeh, an area of Beirut where Hizbollah has a controlling presence, traffic was at a standstill, as people sought to return to their homes. Many waved both Hizbollah and Lebanon’s flags as they sang and shot guns in the air in celebration.

“As soon as the bombs stopped this morning, I came here,” said Hajj Amin, a 56-year-old notary public. “I just wanted to see with my own eyes what the enemy had done to my neighbourhood.”

Nabih Berri, speaker of the Lebanese parliament, called on his compatriots to “return to your land, for it will be glorified by your return to it, even if you live in the rubble of houses”.

Netanyahu said that “the duration of the ceasefire depends on what will happen in Lebanon”.

He also insisted he had reached “full understandings” with the US that Israel will maintain “full military freedom of action” in the event that Hizbollah breaks the terms of the deal.

“If Hizbollah violates the agreement and tries to arm itself, we will attack,” Netanyahu said. “If it tries to rebuild terrorist infrastructure near the border, we will attack. If it launches a rocket, if it digs a tunnel, if it brings in a truck with missiles, we will attack.”

Cartography by Cleve Jones