Is it permissible to take a loan from Arab Bank to purchase wood from Al-Fozan Company, such that the borrower receives a certificate of ownership from the bank and takes it to Al-Fozan, who then gives him the choice between receiving the quantity or authorizing Al-Fozan to sell it at the same value?

The transaction mentioned resembles the Tawarruq program at "Al-Arabi Bank," and it appears to be prohibited due to the condition, custom, or collusion that leads to the commodity returning to its original seller. This makes it a forbidden triple inã (a type of usurious transaction), and the operation becomes a loan with interest, based on the saying of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him): "If you engage in inã transactions, and you hold onto the tails of cattle, and you are content with cultivation, and you abandon jihad in the way of Allah, Allah will inflict upon you a humiliation that He will not remove until you return to your religion."

The fact that the buyer has the right to dispose of the commodity himself and sell it to whomever he wishes, despite the prevalent custom of working otherwise, is merely ink on paper with no value. The Islamic Fiqh Council of the Muslim World League has issued a resolution prohibiting the seller in a Tawarruq contract from undertaking the agency to sell the commodity to another buyer, or arranging for someone to buy it, because it resembles the legally prohibited inã.

To avoid this ambiguity, one can buy the commodity from the bank, take possession of it, and then sell it in the market. Muslims must condemn conventional banks for dealing with riba (usury), and no exception is made for this, except in cases of necessity and the absence of an Islamic alternative, or dealing with an Islamic branch that is completely independent of the usurious bank and has reliable Sharia supervision.