Video: Brian Cox reads “If I Must Die” by Refaat Alareer

On December 7, the beloved Palestinian poet, writer, literature professor, and activist Refaat Alareer was killed in a targeted Israeli airstrike that also killed his brother, his sister, and four of her children.

In the week of mourning since, tributes to Alareer have flooded in from around the world. Many of those tributes have focused on Alareer’s 2011 poem, “If I Must Die,” which he pinned to his Twitter profile on November 1, 2023.

Alareer’s poem has now been translated into more than 40 languages; it has been read aloud from stages and written on the subway walls; it has been printed onto banners and placards and flags and kites held aloft in ceasefire demonstrations around the world.

As one commentator on Twitter said:

“They tried to kill Refaat but ended up making him immortal.”

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Text adapted from Dan Sheehan writing for Lit Hub.

Video running time: 1 minute

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“If I Must Die” by Refaat Alareer

If I must die,
you must live
to tell my story
to sell my things
to buy a piece of cloth
and some strings,
(make it white with a long tail)
so that a child, somewhere in Gaza
while looking heaven in the eye
awaiting his dad who left in a blaze —
and bid no one farewell
not even to his flesh
not even to himself —
sees the kite, my kite you made, flying up above,
and thinks for a moment an angel is there
bringing back love.
If I must die
let it bring hope,
let it be a tale.

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Translation of poem adapted from one by D. P. Snyder