Yes, I confirmed it with 3 other people on IRC a couple months ago. I didn't know google scholar had restored it until I checked right before I wrote the above post. I thought the links were still gone. They had been the last time I'd used google scholar about 3 weeks ago. Back then I also confirmed it myself first using 3 different computers, 4 browsers (with JS disabled), coming from 3 different IP addresses, both logged in to google and logged out. I probably wouldn't have started writing the post at all if I didn't think they were still gone.

I figure in addition to the feedback they received from me (and presumably others) at the time they saw a drop in usage and restored the functional version. But they'll try again.