What is the ruling on using citric acid extracted from the fermentation of molasses in Western countries, which may be used in refining sugar that might involve the use of bones from dead animals, knowing that citric acid is used in foods and in refining cooking oils?

Such manufactured products undergo processing on their raw materials, transforming them from their original state, thus achieving purifying istihalah (transformation). If impure or forbidden substances are added, they are in small, consumed quantities that do not alter the ruling of the original substance. The Ninth Fiqh-Medical Symposium concluded that additive materials in food and medicine that originated from impure or forbidden sources become permissible in Sharia (definition) through istihalah and istihlak (consumption/dissolution). Therefore, the assumption of impurity of bones used in refining sugar does not imply a ruling of prohibition on sugar or substances extracted from its by-products.