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Is it permissible for someone to give his brother – who is experiencing financial hardship and has to pay a financial penalty to the state – from bank interest, and is it permissible for him to take from this interest to pay for his car insurance?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

Usurious bank interests are forbidden (haram), but they should not be left to the usurious bank. Rather, they should be taken and spent on general Muslim welfare, such as for the poor and needy. If a person is poor, there is no objection to giving them these interests to meet their needs. As for the one who possesses these interests, it is not permissible for them to own them or to pay off their debts with them, unless they are poor and in need. This is because the recipients of ill-gotten gains are the poor and needy. Repentance to Allah is obligatory for depositing and withdrawing money from usurious banks.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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