Trump slams Nigeria with high tariff in shocking trade crackdown

President Donald Trump has ignited a global trade firestorm, imposing sweeping tariffs on imports into the United States, with Nigeria among the hardest hit.

Declaring a “national economic emergency,” Trump announced an across-the-board 10% tariff on all foreign goods, while 60 countries deemed “the worst offenders” by his administration will face even steeper levies.

Nigeria has been slapped with a 27% tariff, while South Africa faces a staggering 60% levy on exports to the U.S. The measures, set to take effect on April 5, mark a dramatic shift in global trade dynamics.

Speaking from the White House Rose Garden, Trump declared “Liberation Day” for American industry, calling the moment the beginning of America’s “economic rebirth.”

“Today marks the day America was made wealthy again,” he proclaimed to thunderous applause. “For too long, we have been taken advantage of. Now, it’s our turn to prosper.”

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Trump vowed to bring jobs and manufacturing “roaring back” to the U.S., promising to “pry open foreign markets” while ensuring foreign goods no longer flood American stores unchecked.

As part of his sweeping measures, Trump announced a 25% tariff on all foreign-made vehicles, effective midnight, targeting countries like Japan, South Korea, and Germany. He lambasted nations that limit U.S. exports while dominating the American market.

“We take their cars, they refuse ours. That ends today,” he declared, citing statistics that over 80% of South Korean cars are sold domestically, while U.S. automakers struggle to penetrate foreign markets.

Trump slams Nigeria with high tariff in shocking trade crackdown

Deadly strikes in Gaza as Netanyahu says Israel will seize new military corridor

Israel’s prime minister has said it is expanding its Gaza offensive and establishing a new military corridor to put pressure on Hamas, as deadly Israeli strikes were reported across the Palestinian territory.

Benjamin Netanyahu said Israeli forces were “seizing the Morag Corridor” – a reference to a former Jewish settlement once located between the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Younis.

Earlier, his defence minister said troops would seize large areas for “security zones”.

Meanwhile, 19 Palestinians, including nine children, were killed in an air strike on a UN clinic-turned-shelter in the northern town of Jabalia, a local hospital said. Israel’s military said it targeted “Hamas terrorists”.

Strikes across Gaza on Tuesday night killed at least 20 people, according to hospitals.

The Hamas-run Civil Defence agency said its first responders recovered the bodies of 12 people, including women and children, from a home in Khan Younis.

Rida al-Jabbour said a neighbour and her three-month-old baby were among the dead.

“From the moment the strike occurred we have not been able to sit or sleep or anything,” she told Reuters news agency.

The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports.

There were also reports of extensive bombardment along the border with Egypt overnight.

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The Civil Defence said the strike in Jabalia on Wednesday morning hit two rooms in a clinic run by the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) which was being used as a shelter.

Video verified by the BBC showed dozens of people and ambulances rushing to the building. Smoke was seen billowing from a wing where two floors appeared to have collapsed.

Unrwa’s commissioner-general, Philippe Lazzarini, wrote on X that the building was previously a health centre that it had been heavily damaged earlier in the war.

“Initial reports indicate the facility was sheltering over 700 people when it was hit,” he said, adding that a two-week-old baby was reportedly among the dead. “Displaced families stayed at the shelter after it was hit because they have nowhere else to go.”

Lazzarini said too many Unrwa premises had reportedly been used for fighting purposes by Palestinian armed groups or Israeli forces, and warned that the “total disregard of UN staff, premises or operations is a profound defiance of international law”.

The Israeli military said that it targeted Hamas operatives who were “hiding inside a command and control centre that was being used for co-ordinating terrorist activity and served as a central meeting point”.

It said “numerous steps were taken to mitigate the risk of harming civilians, including the use of aerial surveillance and additional intelligence”.

Hamas denied that its fighters had been using the building.

Fadel Ashour said he had been at the al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City when some of those wounded by the Jabalia strike were brought there for treatment.

“This shelter is home to many people, and every time the Israeli army bombs it, everyone inside is harmed,” he told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Lifeline programme.

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On Wednesday evening, Israel’s prime minister said in a video statement that the IDF had “switched gears” overnight and was “seizing territory, striking the terrorists and destroying the infrastructure”.

“We are also doing something else: We are seizing the Morag Corridor. This will be the second Philadelphi, an additional Philadelphi Corridor,” Netanyahu added, referring to a strip of territory running along the Egyptian border that the Israeli military seized last May.

Dividing Gaza, he said, would increase pressure on Hamas “step by step” and force the group to hand over the 59 hostages it is still holding in Gaza, 24 of whom are believed to be alive.

“As long as they do not give them to us, the pressure will increase until they do.”

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz had announced earlier that the military would be expanding its offensive to clear and “seize large areas that will be added to the security zones of the State of Israel”, without saying where they would be. He added that it would require a “large-scale” evacuation of Palestinians.

Katz also urged Gazans to act to remove Hamas and free remaining Israeli hostages, without suggesting how they should do so.

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum in Israel, which represents many hostages’ relatives, said they were “horrified to wake up” to the news of the expanded military operation. It urged the Israeli government to prioritise securing the release of all the hostages.

Deadly strikes in Gaza as Netanyahu says Israel will seize new military corridor

Democrats drag Trump to court over election overhaul order

The Democratic Party has sued the Trump administration over an attempt to impose sweeping changes on the election systems, including requiring citizenship proof to register to vote and limiting mail-in ballot counting.

In a lawsuit filed Monday, the Democratic Party asked a federal court to block the executive order, which prevents states from counting mail-in ballots that arrive after election day. The president’s directive also requires proof of citizenship to be presented — through documents such as a passport — when registering to vote.

“The President does not get to dictate the rules of our elections,” said the lawsuit filed in Washington by the Democratic National Committee, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and others.