Bassem Youssef, the host of Egyptian political satire show "ElBernameg" hailed as "Egypt's Jon Stewart," made international headlines in March after the Egyptian government ordered his arrest for allegedly insulting Islam and the country's leader, President Mohammed Morsi. Speaking to HuffPost Live host Ahmed Shihab-Eldin Wednesday, Youssef said he wished that would happen every day.
"I would love to be arrested every day," he said. "They gave me free publicity. I should actually split the profit."
Youssef joked about the career boost given to him by the publicity around the arrest, but got serious when discussing the persecution others around the world face.
"Every single day in every part of the world, journalists and TV anchors are incarcerated or held up," he said. "The problem is when you do it to a joker. When you do it to the joker, to the jester, now come on? Are you actually going to hold someone for telling jokes? That kind of resonates more."
In the wide-ranging interview, Youssef — who was honored Tuesday night as one of TIME's 100 most influential people in the world and is appearing on "The Daily Show" Wednesday night — praised Stewart for coming to his defense after his March arrest.
"What Jon did here, he stood up for me," Youssef said. "I think he was standing for much more than this. For the rest of the episode it was not just me: it was defending the freedom of speech. This is the thing about Jon: he doesn't just defend people. It's about principle."
WATCH:
Youssef also joked about the "Twitter war" that broke out between the U.S. Embassy in Egypt and the Egyptian government following his arrest.
"I think the people responsible on both accounts are 15 years old," he said: