This is true for all Meta/Google/Twitter properties. No phone number results in a high chance of suspension irrespective of your usage.
As I also value freedom of association, I am perfectly alright with them refusing to "do business" with me because I do not find the denomination and terms of the transaction acceptable.
I do not really have any inclination to want to compel them to serve me by force of gun, either.
I think both they and myself are better off in this scenario where we just choose to not do business with each other and I find some other business that has more acceptable terms - or I just go without, these services aren't as essential as some people think.
They just were unable to send the code to it, so I could not proceed with whatever appeal process they have in place. That said, if the next step was asking for my face, I'd have probably stopped right there like a poster said. They do have photos of me (Facebook) but it would just be too much.