JERUSALEM (JTA) — No new housing projects have been started in eastern Jerusalem this calendar year, though the number of housing starts in West Bank settlements has risen significantly.

Army Radio reported Monday that there has been an unofficial construction freeze in eastern Jerusalem since the beginning of 2012.  The station used statistics provided by several official government offices as well as the YESHA Council to show that no new construction or marketing of housing in Jerusalem beyond the Green Line has taken place since the beginning of the year.

Yisrael Beiteinu Party head Avigdor Lieberman, the former Foreign Minister and partner in the governing coalition, told Haaretz that the freeze is “a temporary hiatus” in order to help U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry succeed in jump starting Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. . “You don’t always have to be right; you can also be smart,” Lieberman also told Haaretz.

Likud Party lawmaker Moshe Feiglin said in a post on Facebook: “To all the ostriches with their heads in the sand regarding the ban that the prime minister has imposed against my visiting the Temple Mount I propose we begin to understand that this is part of a comprehensive strategy of relinquishing and actively giving away our sovereignty in the city.”

Also Monday, figures released by the Central Bureau of Statistics showed that housing starts in Jewish settlements in the West Bank were significantly higher than in the previous year for the first quarter.

There were 865 starts in 2013, between January and March, as compared to 313 in the previous year.

The rise in housing starts in the West Bank parallels a rise in housing starts throughout the country, however.

The figures were released just days before a scheduled visit to Israel by Kerry in order for him to continue his efforts at bringing Israel and the Palestinians back to the negotiating table.

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