>It would be fair to characterise the region that way going back to the Bronze Age
It would even fairer to say that that region had advanced civilization, huge riches, stable organization, culture (music, poetry, literature), science (math, chemistry, engineering), and so on, at times when America was still inhabited by the Native Americans, and Western Europe was a bunch of barbarian tribes living in shitholes, and well after it started turning into medieval shithole fiefdoms (and then started using the loot of the Americas and the advantage of gunpowder to dominate).
It would even fairer to say that that region had advanced civilization, huge riches, stable organization, culture (music, poetry, literature), science (math, chemistry, engineering), and so on, at times when America was still inhabited by the Native Americans, and Western Europe was a bunch of barbarian tribes living in shitholes, and well after it started turning into medieval shithole fiefdoms (and then started using the loot of the Americas and the advantage of gunpowder to dominate).
Rome and Byzantium excluded of course.