In a surprise offensive on 3 March, the Islamist-dominated Benghazi Defense Brigades seized a number of oil ports from the Libyan National Army-backed House of Representatives.[4] On 7 March, the ports were handed over to the Government of National Accord, prompting the House of Representatives to abandon the UN-brokered peace deal it had previously agreed to with that government, denouncing the BDB capture of the ports as "terrorist attacks".[5] The House then called for Libya's electoral commission to make “all the necessary arrangements to prepare for presidential and parliamentary elections before February 2018".[6]