Climate change has become a major research interest across various scientific disciplines, with a significant

focus on projecting future climate patterns [1]. Serious extreme weather events, such as severe heatwaves,

have risen since the 1950s, and have increased significantly over the past two decades [2,3]. In 2023, the

average global temperature for July reached approximately 17ºC, establishing it as the warmest July in the

period spanning from 1940 to 2023 [4,5]. This rise in temperature mainly contributes to an increase in heat-

weather events will be disastrous in the near future [9-12].

The Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East (EMME) region, comprising 16 diverse countries, including

Palestine, is significantly impacted by climate change [13], this area faces an increasingly arid climate [14].

The EMME region has been designated a climate change 'hotspot' since the beginning of the 21st century

and is home to more than half a billion people exposed to temperature extremes and associated risks [15-

17]. Between the 1960s and 2010, heatwave frequency increased six to seven times, with temperatures rising

almost twice as fast as the global average. By the end of the century, the projections indicate an increase of

up to 5°C [18,19], particularly in July and August months, which threatens human survival [20,21]. In recent

years, Palestine has witnessed a rise in the frequency of heat waves [22], which has resulted in 43 heat-

related deaths [23]. This rate is expected to increase further because of ongoing climate change, and because

inside the building [25]. Also, they found that adding exterior shading can reduce the maximum

indoor temperature in an archetype single detached house in Nablus, Palestine, reached around 33°C

during the month of July under the historical period. In climates similar to that of Palestine in the EMME

region, there have been some studies also investigating indoor thermal conditions. Chkier et al. [27]

conducted a questionnaire survey to assess occupant satisfaction with indoor thermal comfort in Lebanon.

The results indicated that 62% of 168 occupants reported feeling hot and expressed a preference for lower

indoor temperatures.

However, significant efforts have been made globally to tackle the impact of overheating risk [28-36]. Rahif

et al. [37] provided an overview of overheating and discomfort assessment methods in European residential

The majority of prior research [25-38] has primarily focused on evaluating the indoor thermal conditions

of existing buildings based on historical typical years or recent climate conditions. Nevertheless, the

buildings being constructed or retrofitted today are intended to remain functional for around 50 years or

more. Consequently, it becomes crucial to assess their performance, including indoor thermal conditions

and overheating risk, within the context of projected future climates. Mainly, two approaches are employed

for generating future climate scenarios: dynamical downscaling and statistical downscaling. Dynamical

downscaling stands out for its precision in modeling the physical processes to generate realistic weather

variables and its capability to generate climate projections on a yearly basis [39]. However, it comes with

substantial demands in terms of human labor, computational resources, and associated costs. On the other

hand, statistical downscaling offers a more streamlined process by utilizing mathematical equations to

Despite the extensive studies on overheating risk in free-running buildings, particularly in cold climates,

the above review shows the following:

comfort in hot climate regions, especially in the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East (EMME),

compared to studies conducted in cold climate regions.

risks and how they can be mitigated by finding the most effective passive mitigation measures.

overheating in war and hot climates .

based on information obtained from the office responsible for designing and constructing the building.

To achieve the paper's objectives, all data necessary for building simulation modeling for an archetype

single-detached house in Palestine are collected, as described in Section 2.1, in three different climate zones,

as shown in Section 2.2. Overheating hours that exceed acceptable limits are calculated as shown in Section

2.3. Future years are generated as described in Section 2.4. In cases where there is a risk of overheating in

buildings, mitigation measures are implemented, as detailed in Section 2.5. In Section 2.6, all simulation

scenarios are summarized.

A single-detached house with two floors is selected as a case study. This building is constructed in a typical

Palestinian construction style [44] with stone, concrete, and hollow concrete block exterior walls, a concrete

flat roof/floor, and single-glazed windows without any insulation. This building relies on natural

ventilation, internal shading, and thermal mass to cool the building during summer. Table 1 describes the

details of the archetype single-detached house envelope, and it represents the low energy-efficient building

level of the LEEB.

is 40%. The first floor contains three bedrooms: a master bedroom MBR (26 m2), a northwest bedroom- BR

(16 m2), and a southwest bedroom- BR1 (13 m2). The living room is on the ground floor (36 m2).