Is it permissible to eat meat from Western restaurants – such as fast-food restaurants in Britain – which follow the method of stunning the animal (cattle) with a captive bolt gun to immobilize it, and then cutting its head, taking into consideration a previous fatwa (No. 12776) that permits eating the slaughtered animals of the People of the Book if they are immobilized and slaughtered before dying from the stunning?

The animal must be alive at the time of slaughter, and the sign of this is the flowing of lifeblood. If the animal is immobilized by a bullet before slaughter, and it is confirmed that the shooting does not kill it but only stops its movement, and that life still remains in it, then it is slaughtered Islamically, its meat is permissible to eat. There is no harm in using low-voltage electric current to stun the animal if it does not torture it and serves a benefit. However, it is forbidden to eat the animal if its life is taken by electric shock before slaughter.