‘Your little heart … could not endure.’ Born with a serious heart condition, seven-year-old Rahaf suffered cardiac arrest after being rescued from a boat in distress.
“On the shore of death, your journey ended.
Your little heart, still unripe, could not endure.
It was filled with love, overflowing until the very last breath.
You left, my beautiful one, my little one…”
These are the painful, mournful words of a father grieving, written in the hours after his seven-year-old daughter suffered a cardiac arrest — shortly after she herself was rescued from a boat in distress in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea.
Her name was Rahaf and she and her family had just been brought on board the search and rescue ship Ocean Viking, which is run by SOS Mediterranee and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).
Shortly after the rescue, Rahaf, who had an underlying heart condition, went into cardiac arrest. After CPR by the team on board, she was airlifted to a hospital in Malta. Tragically, she did not survive the journey and passed away in the helicopter.
Plunged into grief, her father put his pain into words, which he inscribed with a ballpoint pen on a simple piece of white paper. He then asked that this poem and the story of his daughter be shared with the world — as an homage to his daughter and to bring attention to the situation facing people crossing the Mediterranean.
The family of four was among a group of 92 migrants rescued from a boat in distress in the Central Mediterranean, near Malta.
Here is the full version of the father’s poem:
“On the shore of death, your journey ended.
Your little heart, still unripe, could not endure.
It was filled with love, overflowing until the very last breath.
You left, my beautiful one, my little one…
Your gentle voice has vanished forever
Leaving behind a father, a mother, and a sister–Lost, wandering between sea and sky.
How could your kind heart leave your dears suddenly?
You bore the hardship of travel, the cruelty of the waves–All for what?
For a dignified life. Yes, you have found it now, Rahaf. You are in eternal bliss.
May your soul rest in peace, my love.”
An ocean of human suffering
Sadly, Rahaf’s death is not an isolated case. The Mediterranean is one of the deadliest migration routes in the world. At least 115 children lost their lives attempting to cross the Mediterranean in 2024 alone.
Since 2014, more than 31,000 migrants have drowned or gone missing during the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean Sea.
Behind every number is a person: a child, father, a sister–risking everything in search of safety.
To help avert more tragic stories and unnecessary deaths, the IFRC remains committed to the rescue efforts and to working aboard the Ocean Viking to ensure that people lost and in distress in the vast Mediterranean receive critical life-saving care they need, as well as psychological support to help them deal with the stresses they have been through.
Supported with an ongoing emergency appeal to support their operations in the Mediterranean, the IFRC operates what it calls a “humanitarian service point” or HSP on the Ocean Viking. This floating, mobile HSP offers several critical services, including medical care, psychological support, and other kinds of counseling to help migrants cope with what they’ve been through and prepare for what may lie ahead when they finally reach a European port and new challenges arise.
