You could call it unintentional terrorism I suppose. The timing with what's going on in Ukraine along with Putin's repeated threats makes it look political even if it wasn't. It's entirely possible they just happened to be a group of Russians who picked the wrong target at the wrong time. It's also entirely possible they were doing the Kremlin's work and just not announcing it publicly because that's not really how Putin plays the game.

I have to believe that played a role in the response they received as well.