A Syrian Christian captured by ISIS that was released after five months said that he had to call his family while he was being electrocuted because the terrorists wanted to force his family to pay a $80,000 ransom.

The man, who wished to remain anonymous, spoke with New York Magazine and related his story of torture.

He said that he was in Beirut and returning to Syria with a co-worker when they stopped at what they believed to be a checkpoint for the Syrian army.  Instead, it was the terrorists who took them to a location and chained them to the wall.

“Anyway, we were blindfolded and chained, and every day they would torture us. They would come in, one at a time, and electrocute us or beat us with anything they could find,” the man said. “But they didn’t kill me because they wanted to ransom me. One time, they made me speak to my family on the phone as they were electrocuting me. Then, they made me call a friend, who told them he would pay.”

He said the same day he was forced to call his family, they took the other Christian hostage into the room next to him and shot him to death.

“Then one day, they told me and my friend, the man from Aleppo, that our families had paid and we were to be released,” he explained. “They threw us in the streets of Aleppo, near the Turkish border. My God, it was the most wonderful feeling I’ve ever had. There were Free Syrian Army soldiers. We went to them, and they took us to a church. I saw the cross and I thought, I’m alive.”