links from spreadsheet not displaying in google html service page

Question

on google script editor of ogle spreadsheets, I am trying to created a webpage which retrieves values from spreadsheet and displays. However, it is not displaying the items linked on the spreadsheet.It is displaying static values but not links. what am I doing wrong? Given below is my code.

Below code in my .gs sheet

function doGet() {
    return HtmlService
        .createTemplateFromFile('Index')
        .evaluate()
        .setSandboxMode(HtmlService.SandboxMode.IFRAME);
}

function getData() {
    return SpreadsheetApp
        .openById('abcdef')
        .getActiveSheet()
        .getDataRange()
        .getValues();
    getURL();
}

function getURL() {
    var range = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSheet().getActiveCell();
    var links = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveRange().getFormulas();

    //logs - Google
    var values = range.getValues();

    //logs - =HYPERLINK("http://www.google.com", "Google")
    var formula = range.links;

    //simple regex to get first quoted string
    var url = /"(.*?)"/.exec(formula);

    //logs - http://www.google.com
    return url;
}

My index.html has the following code

<? var data = getData(); ?>
<table>
<? for (var i = 0; i < data.length; i++) { ?> 
    <tr>
    <? for (var j = 0; j < data[i].length; j++) { ?>
        <td>
            <a id="button"  href=#><?= data[i][j] ?>  </a>
        </td>
    <? } ?>
    </tr>
<? } ?>
</table>

Answer 1

Playing with Sandy's code above I found that most urls were refused for many reasons (non https, same origin, etc) so I looked at the doc and ended with this version that includes a target="_blank" parameter and that opens all the urls I tried.

<? var data = getData(); ?>
<table>
<? for (var i = 0; i < data.length; i++) { ?> 
<tr >
<? for (var j = 0; j < data[i].length; j++) { ?>
<td > <a id="button"  href=" <?= data[i][j] ?> " target="_blank"> <?= data[i][j] ?></a></td>
<? } ?>
</tr>
<? } ?>
</table>

note also that urls in the spreadsheet must be in the form http://www.google.com to work, a short form like www.google.com won't work.