hristmas Eve will be an exceptionally unhappy one in Bethlehem's Manger Square tonight. The traditional midnight mass will occur virtually under the shadow of Israeli tanks, with no Palestinian officials and almost no tourists or ordinary worshipers. It will be a charade — a sadly appropriate one — of celebration of the Prince of Peace.

No one who follows the Israeli-Palestinian dispute can remember a more dispiriting time. Yet the United States decided late last week that now was not the moment to adopt the road map for peace that it had worked out over the past months with its allies. Rather it accepted advice from Israel's prime minister, Ariel Sharon, to wait because of Israel's elections late next month.

The three other members of the group that developed the plan, the so-called "quartet" — the United Nations, the European Union and Russia — are unhappy about the delay. They are right. Elections should not pose an impediment to the pursuit of American policy. Moreover, if the United States soon finds itself fighting on two fronts in the Arab world — against Iraq and militant Muslims — it can only help to have presented a just solution to a dispute angering Muslims across the globe.

The quartet's road map is an elaboration on the speech President Bush gave last June in which he called for far-reaching Palestinian changes, including a new leadership, as a prerequisite for progress. Once they begin that process in earnest and work to end their violent attacks, Israel would withdraw from the areas it has reoccupied in the past year and freeze settlement activity. The plan calls for a Palestinian state within three years.

This is reasonable. No one expects an instant solution. But by waiting to unveil the road map until after a new Israeli government is formed, which could be several months, Washington seems to be hoping to wrap this problem into a broader recasting of the region after regime change in Iraq. That is a dangerous gamble.

Arab radicals like to promote a myth that all problems in their region stem from Israel's existence. This is patently false. But the Palestinian-Israeli dispute is unquestionably posing a growing danger to the world. Mr. Sharon seems to have persuaded President Bush that Al Qaeda terror and Palestinian terror require the same response. To insist that there is a distinction is not to condone the monstrous nature of either.

The situation on the ground is growing worse. The leading Palestinian peace activist, Sari Nusseibeh, was just stripped of his post as chief of Jerusalem policy for the Palestinians by Yasir Arafat. Polls show more than 60 percent of Palestinians support suicide bombings. Israel is stepping up its building of settlements in the West Bank. Palestinians are living in wretched conditions. All of this allows Arab radicals to avoid facing their own inadequacies and blame their ills on Israel. By taking away the excuse, Washington could help force Arabs to face the truth of their problems.