From what I could figure out, the song "First We Take Manhattan" by Leonard Cohen is about terrorism, the desire to "make a change from within" against the corrupted western culture with its "fashion business", "drugs that keep you thin", etc.
So far so good. However, it bugs me why he chose Manhattan and Berlin of all the cities in the world? Those are not the fashion capitals, and as far as I can tell, they're not the best representatives of the western culture he's trying to change. For example, New York or London come first when I think about fashion or Western/European culture.
Is this explained somewhere, or did I miss something in the song meaning?