A young Palestinian man was praying on the side of a road near Ramallah. He was in sujood, the most vulnerable posture a human being can take—forehead to the ground, hands down, heart exposed, trusting Allah.
And an Israeli settler decided that even that was too much dignity.
In the video I’m embedding here, you see a four-wheeler come in and deliberately run him over while he is still praying. The young man survives, but he’s visibly dazed afterward—possibly concussed—trying to stand, stumbling, then hobbling toward a van like someone whose body and brain are still trying to understand what just happened.
Before I say anything else, I need to ask you from the heart to become a member today. I keep this work free for the world—for readers in Gaza, for students in public schools, for families living in deep poverty, for elders on fixed incomes—because a smaller circle of people who can afford it chooses to carry some of the cost. Please click here to become a member and click here to join as a monthly, annual, or founding member. Your support keeps this work free for them, and even for you when you can’t afford to pay.
Now let’s talk about what you’re seeing—and why it should terrify anyone who believes in basic human dignity.
This wasn’t an “accident.” Not even close. The posture matters. The timing matters. The location matters. A man praying in sujood isn’t a threat. He isn’t attacking anyone. He isn’t holding a weapon. He isn’t even looking at you.
The only “crime” here is being Palestinian in a land where settlers have been trained—by the ideology of domination and by decades of impunity—to treat Palestinian life as something disposable. To treat Palestinian worship as a provocation. To treat Palestinian presence as a problem to be corrected with humiliation and violence.
And that’s why this is terrorism.
Not because I’m trying to be inflammatory. Because terrorism is violence used to intimidate and control a population. This is a message sent through a body: “Even your prayer is not safe. Even your God-facing moments can be invaded. Even your forehead on the earth can be punished.”
If you’ve never been under occupation, it can be hard to understand how deep the psychological warfare goes. Occupation isn’t only checkpoints and papers. It’s the daily ritual of making someone feel unsafe in their own skin. It’s the constant reminder that you can be harmed for nothing. It’s the enforced lesson that there is no normal life here—not because Palestinians refuse normal life, but because the system refuses to allow it.
And if you’re American, I want you to recognize a pattern you already know.
So much of how these colonizers behave in the West Bank reminds me of the worst horrors of the Civil Rights Movement—when racist white men would terrorize Black people for trying to exist with dignity, for trying to walk, for trying to sit, for trying to vote, for trying to travel, for trying to drink water, for trying to be human. The violence wasn’t always “official” on paper, but it was protected by official power. Police looked the other way. Courts excused it. Politicians winked at it. Entire communities were trained to treat cruelty as normal.
That is what the West Bank looks like.
Settlers act like a law unto themselves because, in practice, they are. They know the system will protect them. They know the soldier standing nearby will treat Palestinians like the problem. They know the story will be written in a way that blurs responsibility. They know the world will argue about “context” while a young man tries to stand up after being run over in prayer.
And I need to say something else, especially for Muslims.
Sujood is sacred. Sujood is where the believer is closest to Allah. This is the posture of humility, the posture of surrender, the posture of trust. To assault someone in sujood is not only violence against a body—it is contempt for the most basic act of worship. It is the kind of cruelty that says, “Your faith doesn’t protect you here.”
But faith does protect us—just not always the way we want in the moment. Faith protects us by keeping our moral compass alive. By refusing to let brutality become normal. By making us insist on justice even when the powerful laugh at justice.
Family, I’m embedding this video because I refuse to let this be treated like “another clip.” I refuse to let a man being run over while praying become a scroll-by moment in your feed.
If this man was Jewish, the clip would be on the news. Period.
Watch the way he tries to stand. Watch the disorientation. Watch how quickly the world keeps moving.
And then ask yourself: What kind of society produces people who do this—and protects them after they do it?
This is not “conflict.” This is domination.
And it will not stop on its own. Systems like this only stop when the world stops rewarding them—financially, diplomatically, militarily, and morally.
If you want me to keep doing the work of naming this clearly—keeping it free, keeping it honest, keeping it impossible to look away—please stand with me. Please click here to become a member and click here to join as a monthly, annual, or founding member.
Love and appreciate each of you.
Your friend and brother,
Shaun
If this made you sick, don’t numb yourself. Learn the pattern. Study how occupation uses both law and vigilantism, and how impunity becomes policy. Then share this video with someone who still thinks “settlers are just civilians” and ask them one simple question: What would you call it if someone ran over a person in prayer in your town—and the system protected them?