Drif was married to Rabah Bitat, one of the heads of the FLN and president of the National Assembly. In Algeria, she is considered a heroine in the Algerian War of Independence against French colonisation. She was a part of the FLN's bomb network and during the Algerian War of Independence, she worked with Ali La Pointe, Hassiba Ben Bouali and Yacef Saâdi, head of the . Her time in the war is most known in connection with the Milk Bar Café bombing in 1956.