Four men of the Syrian Arab Army stand in front of a convoy of U.S. occupation forces and prevent it from entering the village of Tal Aswad in the southern countryside of Manbij, whereupon the convoy reversed.

The definition quoted is absurdly wrong - see any textbook eg. Yutaka Arai-Takahashi, The Law of Occupation) though it doesn't matter here: this is an occupation of surrender consequent on the expulsion of the Islamic State. Occupation can be 'hostile' or 'occupatio pacifico', there is whole body of types. The UN has carried out several occupations e.g. in Somalia, Cambodia, etc.

Of course there is never anywhere a suggestion that the occupying force is acting in any way wrongly, as in the occupation of Germany and Japan after the war.

It is quite plain that the US is not occupying anything; the SDF is the occupying force. No US officer is officiating at tribunals, policing, legislating, nothing. Compare the occupation of Japan.

The US is acting as the air force of the SDF, that's about it.

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