The date of Christmas was set 600 years before the crusades began.
Several pagan winter festivals contributed aspects to the nature of the celebration but the use of December 25th (which was in use by the mid 5th century) was probably to aid the forced conversion of Mithraists (a popular pagan religion with a mythology very similar to Christianity that had laid claim to the 25th well somewhat before Christians) by Constantine.
Of course, the establishment of a day celebrating Christ's birth was a political maneuver by the school of early theologians promoting the idea that Jesus was devine from birth as opposed to those who believed it wasn't until his baptism.
The incorporation of Yule traditions into Christmas didn't happen until about a century after Christmas had been established as a feast day. And then for more than a milennium they were only a part of Northern European Christmas celebrations. It wasn't until England became the major economic power that the traditions began to spread.
...since we were digressed anyway.
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