yes, it is very essential step, phenol treatment disrupts high concentration proteins because presence of low, high concentration proteins causes attachment of proteins to your r-DNA causes contamination and purity of your r-DNA decreases.
while construction as it important to cut all the ends which are due to restriction cuts,and should not be due to mechanical breaking at random sequences , where in many fragments will be wasted.hence where phenol extraction step causes mechanical breakage i think it isnt necessary.But my question is :IS it a mandatory step ?