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I apparently deleted a message thread over 30 days ago, as Recently Deleted does not contain what I am looking for, however I validated the missing content was present on a device I had offline. After putting that device online and allowing it to sync with iCloud the thread has been deleted.

My objective is to restore this thread. I have local iOS/iPadOS and Time Machine backups with this thread. What is the easiest method is to merge this missing thread/content into my current iCloud for Messages database?

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When you restore a backup with those messages in it, the next iCloud for Messages sync will just erase them again, just like you saw with the offline device. I don't know of any way to undo/remove the delete operations for those messages in the iCloud for Messages sync history.

If you wanted to experiment, we could see if there is a way to tweak the messages in (a copy of) the backup to reintroduce those messages as if they were new/different messages and not the ones iCloud for Messages has recorded as deleted. That is if you have patience, a spare device to restore the adjusted backup to, and the phone number and date range of messages you want to try to put back ;)

You could also choose extract the messages out of the iOS backups you have with a third party app (the one I am a developer for is Decipher TextMessage, there's also ones like iMazing and iExplorer). That won't help you re-merge the content onto your iPhone/iCloud for Messages database, but it will give you access to the information in them if that is what is important.

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