This is possible due to inertia of motion. which is nothing but newton's first law.
according to this law , an object tries to retain its state of motion or rest unless acted upon by an external force.
consider an object placed on a paper, initially both the object and paper are at rest. to pull the paper , we apply force on the paper and paper gains velocity. but the object keeps its motion of rest and hence the paper can be removed without moving the object.
