By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON, May 1 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Friday the U.S. Navy was acting "like pirates" in carrying out Washington's naval blockade of Iranian ports during the U.S. and Israel's war against Iran.

Trump made the comments while describing the seizure by U.S. forces of a ship a few days ago.

"We took over the ship, we took over the cargo, we took over the oil. It's a very profitable business," Trump said in remarks on Friday evening. "We're like pirates. We're sort of like pirates but we are not playing games."

WASHINGTON, May 1 (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department said on Friday it was approving military sales worth a total of over $8.6 billion to Middle Eastern allies Israel, Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.

The announcement comes as the U.S. and Israel's war against Iran marked nine weeks since its start and more than three weeks since a fragile ceasefire in the Iran war came into effect.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh, Ryan Patrick Jones and Christian Martinez)

By Nate Raymond

May 1 (Reuters) - A federal judge on Friday blocked U.S. President Donald Trump's administration from moving ahead next week with plans to end temporary legal protections that have allowed more than 2,800 people from Yemen to live and work in the United States.

U.S. District Judge Dale Ho in Manhattan issued the order at the behest of a group of Yemeni nationals who had sued over the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's decision to strip them effective Monday of the Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, they were previously granted.

May 1 (Reuters) - China's ambassador to the United Nations said on Friday that there was a need to revisit the U.N. Security Council's decision to end the mandate of a longrunning peacekeeping mission in Lebanon at the end of this year.

The U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), established in 1978, patrols Lebanon's southern border with Israel. Last year, the Security Council unanimously agreed to begin a withdrawal of the mission at the end of 2026.

By Gram Slattery

WASHINGTON, May 1 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday told reporters he had spoken with Iraqi prime minister-designate Ali al-Zaidi on Thursday, and voiced strong support for him.

"With our help, he won, and we want him to do very well. And I told him that the United States is with him all the way. It was a great victory, the new head of Iraq is somebody that we support, very strongly," Trump told reporters before he departed the White House for a trip to Florida.

May 1 (Reuters) - China's U.N. ambassador Fu Cong said on Friday it was an urgent necessity to maintain the Iran war ceasefire and that he was sure the Strait of Hormuz issue would be high on the agenda if it is still closed when U.S. President Donald Trump goes to China this month.

Fu told reporters at the United Nations the strait needed to be reopened as quickly as possible. He said China was very concerned about remarks it had heard recently about the ceasefire being temporary and the need to initiate another round of attacks.

By Patricia Zengerle and Bo Erickson

WASHINGTON, May 1 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's administration argued that a ceasefire with Tehran had "terminated" hostilities as a legal deadline arrived on Friday for coming to Congress about the two-month Iran war.

Under the 1973 War Powers Resolution, the president can wage military action for only 60 days before ending it, asking Congress for authorization or seeking a 30-day extension due to "unavoidable military necessity regarding the safety of United States Armed Forces" while withdrawing forces.

May 1 (Reuters) - Iranian soccer federation president Mehdi Taj said Canadian officials cleared him to enter the country for the FIFA Congress, but Iran’s delegation chose to turn back after being held for three hours and questioned at a Toronto airport, Iranian media reported on Friday.

Taj, a former member of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), said he was questioned by Canadian immigration about his ties to the group, but was ultimately allowed into the country for the pre-World Cup gathering in Vancouver.

Lebanon's health ministry said 13 people were killed on Friday in Israeli strikes in the south, including in a town where Israel's army had issued an evacuation order despite a ceasefire.

The strikes in Habboush killed eight people, including a child and two women, and wounded 21 others, the ministry said, raising an earlier toll.

Other strikes in Zrariyeh killed four people, two of them women, and wounded four more, it said.

The ministry also reported a strike in Ain Baal near the coastal city of Tyre killed one person and wounded seven others.

Throwing more than $5 billion at a divisive new tour and walking away after five seasons does not look like good business, but LIV Golf wasn't all bad news for Saudi Arabia.

Oil-funded LIV, which poached top stars and sent golf's establishment into a tailspin, helped push the conservative kingdom into global view -- one of its key aims, experts say.

They said the exit, confirmed on Thursday after weeks of speculation, does not signal a flight of Saudi money from sport, even after the Middle East war that sparked Iranian attacks around the Gulf.