Cherif passed away in Catanzaro, Calabria, southern Italy a few days before Christmas on the 22nd of December 1951, a legal dispute ensued between his Italian and Egyptian families over his body, after months it was finally decided he would be buried in Catanzaro, where his remains are still today.

He was living with his daughter (from the Italian branch) during the last period of his life first in Rome and then Catanzaro, his daughter married an Italian.